Sky Water
by jenni3penny
Summary: Post mini-series. Cain/DG. The strain of rebuilding the Outer Zone while trying to rebuild themselves. "Bless her for that misguided innocence…"
1. Chapter 1

"_Where are they?"_

Gone, baby, gone. They were gone.

Like the rain water evaporating from the cup Jeb used to leave on the porch roof when the heat lightening crackled the gun-gray-sky.

"You think that'll make it rain?" she'd always laced a laugh into her voice when leaning her face toward their son.

"It'll rain." The boy had thumped a smug smile up at him, placing chubby sun-browned hands on his hips. "Right, Pops?"

"Sure." Wyatt had nodded firmly every time. "I believe it will."

He'd never been able to not smile when the cup had started to fill up wet and wild.

Splashing and bright in the flashes of the Outer Zone's best light show.

"Toldja." Jeb's young and pleased voice was fading clear and empty, the repetition removed from in front of his eyes and disappearing like evaporating water.

"_Where are they?" _

In the sky water, Tin Man… Gone.

* * *

He woke with a rattling breath, chest tight and fist clenched low against his stomach. Unintentionally he thumbed the inside of his wedding ring while he squinted his eyes toward focusing in the darkness. Cain mentally catalogued his surroundings, filing each of his senses one after the other.

The chair was stiff but sturdy under his lower back and sleep numbed legs but he could feel the weight of his laden holster digging the meat of his thigh.

Forgotten fear tasted like bile in the back of his throat and akin to disgust on his tongue.

It was a lulled hush in the room but there was a buzz of movement outside the shut window frames.

He could smell the tang of his own sweat and the grime of leftover gunpowder.

It was blissfully dark as he let himself relax his body.

He lifted his hand mere inches in front of his face, staring at the ring that seemed too tight after a sweaty few hours of nightmared sleep.

He couldn't stay in here, even if being alone was an odd comfort to his memories.

"Where's Jeb?" even the scraped gruffness of his own voice surprised him and he cleared his swollen and sore throat.

"I told you to get some rest." She weighted her words quietly, even if they did have some common sense to them. "That shoulder isn't going to heal if you - "

"Where's Jeb?" He repeated after swallowing to soften the fire in his throat. He hadn't recognized the pain echoing down his right side until she mentioned it. Now it thundered up and down and echoed in his tight spine.

"He's sleeping." DG murmured quietly and wiped the heel of her palm against her jaw slowly. "Finally. Like you should be."

Cain nodded his head down, mildly ashamed of the guarded but concerned glances she kept washing against him. She was fidgeting her hands in a way that seemed to say she was unsure of what she should do next. He took the moment to look over her, noting the redness that rode high on her cheeks and the shallow weariness that darkened below her blue eyes. He let his tongue skip his bottom lip, hand resting against his holster, and he looked around them briefly at the resistance fighters and soldiers that were milling around them.

"The young princess tells me I should rest," his other hand motioned between them idly, "while she sleeps on her feet."

"Young princess?" she snorted and the smile that perked her lips made her eyes a little brighter in the dull gas and oil lamp lighting.

Wyatt watched her eyes pale as she watched two young, very young, men draw another wounded boy staggering into the room. Her glance flicked quickly to the way he was letting his right shoulder hang slightly lower than his left. He flexed his palm open and closed in response to the wide-eyed concern that blanked her face paler.

"Tell ya what, Princess" he sighed as he leaned his upper body closer to her, "I'll let Fluffy and the medics make sweet medical love to this shoulder gouge if you promise to clean up and get some rest."

DG eyed him in open disbelief, "Really?"

He tried to shrug and caught the breathless half laugh noise she let up between them when he winced into it. "Really."

"You gotta stop calling me Princess." She shook her head amiably and curled her fingers into the fabric of his duster, tugging him lightly into a slow walk.

Cain smirked and followed into her languid steps, "Can't stop bein' what you are, Princess."

"You're right." She smirked playfully back at him. "Jackass."

* * *

"Take off your jacket." Her hands were nudging him gently back into a chair and he couldn't help the smug smirk that slung over his lips as he leaned back wincing.

"You first." A sudden giddiness of relief had washed over him and he laughed quietly at the surprised look she flashed down over him.

His humor filled face seemed a challenge to her and Cain watched as she slugged off the leather jacket she'd been huddling in for days. DG tossed it aside to the table that had been knocked and jaunted so that glasses and other ephemera were strewn forgotten across it. She blinked down at him, suddenly seeming more fragile in just the dusty and dingy blue shirt.

Wyatt blinked his acquiescence and leaned forward, easing the left side of the duster off before struggling with the right. He sighed softly into the way she leaned her knees against his bent legs so that she could slowly pry the fabric from damaged and swollen skin. He kept his head low, knowing that he was dangerously close to eyeing the young woman's breasts. Knowing that more than likely, he wouldn't stop himself if he started in on that lust-laden train. He jumped slightly when she tugged the hat off his head as well as the coat from his body. It was with mild amusement that he watched her set both items of clothing light and gentle to the table beside her own.

"Raw should be here soon."

He wasn't sure, as she leaned in to inspect the way blood had crusted and steepled his shirt to his skin, how she could still smell as light and warm as she did. "Princess - "

"DG." She corrected, a look of concentration on her face as she tried to pull a dried bit of fabric from the wound.

"Damn." He hissed quietly and caught the sidelong arch of her eyebrow.

"Don't be a pansy."

"Don't be a bully." He murmured back and steeled his shoulder against the way she kept prying the fabric away.

"Shirt too." Her voice had gone even quieter and Wyatt lifted a hand to catch both of hers, slowly drawing them down and away from the wound as he nodded.

He stood slowly in front of her, forcing her body back a step while he popped the bracket and buckle on his holster. Cain cocked his head toward the water pitcher that had mercifully stayed upright on the table and she stepped toward it in agreement. DG fished through the tossed up rubble on the long dining table, searching for glasses and bowls while he laid the holstered weapon on top of the duster.

"Princess?" the hushed tone of Raw's voice from the doorway did nothing to stop the both of them from jumping and while one of Cain's hands went back to the pistol, the other hand had already dug into the fabric of DG's shirt, drawing her back close.

The straightening of her spine and the cocked angle of her neck matched the way her suddenly labored breathing was pressing her stomach against the knot his fist had made in her shirt. One of her hands covered his and rubbed a soothing warmth before she stepped away, forcing him to release her shirt. He flushed red against pale in slight embarrassment, setting the gun back to the table while he watched the welcoming smile she washed upon the nervous Viewer.

"Hey, Raw." One of her hands waved the Viewer closer. "Hope they didn't wake you."

"Can't sleep." Raw shook his head and moved toward them slowly. "Too much."

Cain watched the way both the Viewers pawed hands lifted and waved beside his ears. He caught the sympathetic glance DG gave him before she rubbed the other man's fur covered arm. He started drawing his shirt tails from his pants, turning away from them and only half listening to the concerned way Raw was asking after Azkadellia. He slowly drew the shirt off his body, letting it pull against the dried and crusted blood that was bracing it tight against his shoulder. He hissed another angry litany of curses and jumped hard when he felt a cool hand against the clammy and sweated skin of his back.

"One of Jeb's field medics is waiting for you, Tin Man."

He disliked that even when it was her small and gentle hand against his back, he still itched for a weapon.

"Not until you're cleaned up and eating something." He banked the words gruffly behind him. "That was the deal, Princess."

"Cain - "

"That was our deal." He murmured and let bottomless blue eyes turn back against the way she was hovering near his back.

"Raw," she huffed their companion's name, "Wanna order me a steak?"

Cain just smirked back and felt her tap her fingers against the flex of his shoulder blade before she stepped away.

* * *

"You know what we need?" she asked around the chunk of roll she had just bitten off.

"A napkin?" Cain taunted at her, eyes squinting against the mild twinges of pain that were prickling at him from his right shoulder as the medic scraped the dirt and grime from the wound.

DG frowned at him and swallowed, "Thank you for the etiquette lesson Mr Tight Pants."

He coughed up a laugh at the eye roll she lavished between them and went hush while the medic continued to clean the wound. Raw was leaned toward the back of his chair but not touching it, hovering quietly with slow and shallow breathing. It was rhythmic enough to comfort him while he watched the young woman start bandaging the wound. He lifted his arm a few inches and swallowed against the hot spread of pain, making sure that the hurt didn't shadow his face while he glanced back to DG. She had launched back into her tirade already.

"…we need to leave Central City."

"You need to get out of Central City." He nodded. "Your entire family does. But not until it's safe for all of you to move."

"I don't think we should all be together." She chewed around the food and swallowed hard, grinning thanks up to Raw as he poured her a glass of water. "Is that stupid? If we separate?"

Wyatt eyed her with a cocked glance as she chugged at the glass of water. He thanked the medic quietly and then stood, pulling the shirt back up off the table. DG shook her head quickly and waved toward Raw, her fingers dancing between them. She nodded him back toward the chair and Cain just cocked a glance at her.

"Now isn't the time to play cowboy, Cain." DG let a little dismissive quality into her voice and waved at the chair again. "Sit."

"Longcoats are going to re-organize. Especially if they find Zero and set him loose." He spoke gently as he sat, settling the dingy white and blue shirt to his lap as he leaned his shoulders back once again. "It would be easier to protect all of you if you were in one place but… I can't argue with you. It's smarter to split you up. We run the risk of dividing resources, but avoid the possibility of the entire royal family being taken out all - "

"Quiet, Tin Man." Raw's gentle voice him was a cautious pleading as his furry hands settled to the older man's shoulders.

"Yeah, " DG stood and stepped slowly toward the both of them, "Hush up, Tin Man."

He sat back farther in the chair, tipping his head hard against the high back edge of it. DG looked over the way his tired eyes dipped closed, head shaking minutely as he worked thoughts through his head and they flooded silent but visible over his face. She knelt in front of him and reached out, feeling him jump under her hand when she tried to still his fidgeting fingers.

"You can't always save the whole world at once, Mr Cain."

His eyes flared open, crystalline blue and bright, "Why not? Apparently you can."

She felt the flush go from her cheeks and all the way down her throat to her chest.

And he smirked when he saw it too.

Jackass.

* * *

"He's gonna kill us when he realizes what you two did."

DG grunted as she tried to lift both of the large man's booted feet, "Shut up and lift, Glitch."

Raw moved in and helped pull the broody Tin Man's prone body up onto the cleared wooden dining table, helping her angle his feet up onto it while Glitch accidentally thumped Cain's head onto the wood. All of them stilled sharply, waiting to see if the rattling thump would wake him. When he didn't even stir, DG snorted a laugh and smiled at her companions.

"Good job, Raw." She nodded, "Sleeping Beauty's out."

"He's going to filet us." Glitch grumbled again and tucked the other man's shirt under his sleep heavy head. "With the razor. You know he knows how."

"Glitch." DG rolled her eyes at him. "Chill."

"No, I'm fine." He wiped sweat off his forehead and then checked his zipper out of nervousness. "It's actually a little warm in here."

She let off a slight and breathy laugh, taking up residence in the seat beside the table, shrugging down into the warmth that he'd left. Her hand aimed for his hat and she tucked it on her head amiably before smiling wearily at the other two. Glitch was half smirking down at her and Raw looked tired, his gentle eyes resting over the prone Tin Man.

"You said my mother wants to meet in the morning?" she spoke softly, suddenly very aware of the low even breathing Cain was letting off.

Glitch nodded, "She requested your presence. And Cain."

DG just nodded back. "You guys go rest. Eat something. Clean up."

"We should - "

"I've got it, Raw." She waved them off and leaned back farther in the chair, "Go ahead. I'll take the heat."

Her eyes were clipped shut as they left and she didn't open them again until she'd heard the hushed sway of the large door closing behind them.

* * *

"I forgot."

DG startled slightly and lifted her head away from the way she'd been fingering the blood tacky hole in his shirt. Her eyes met his and she swallowed shallow and hard against the piercing blue of his glare. Her shoulders shrugged up slightly and she straightened her back in an attempt to seem stronger.

"Forgot what?"

"That you're smarter than you look." Cain let his head loll back so that he was staring at the ceiling, one of his hands resting loose on his bare stomach. "Where's the gun?"

"Under the table."

"Where's my coat?" he let one word slowly follow another, his voice sounding slightly fuzzed and muzzy.

"Under you."

"Are you wearing my hat?"

She just tipped the brim farther down on her forehead. "Yes ma'am, I am."

"I don't even get a pillow?" he rubbed to fingers at the bridge of his nose. "I've saved your life, you know?"

She lifted the worn shirt idly, suddenly embarrassed that she'd been fingering the nearly threadbare fabric. "You threw it in your sleep so I didn't think you deserved it back."

She tried not to watch him sit up but it wasn't easy not to watch the way he pressed himself up on sturdy arms. DG studied the stretch of his taut spine and flexed forearms as he shook the fuzziness from his thoughts. She watched him glance down at the still bandaged wound before crossing his left hand over his body to poke at it. She assumed it didn't bother him as he nodded and swung his still clothed legs and boot heavy feet off the table.

"You're damn devious, Princess."

"I never once went back on our deal."

"You did." He tweaked the hat off her head and flopped it casually back onto his own.

DG frowned up at him suddenly. "I ate."

"You still look like you got thrown forty yards by a Runner and then trampled under the entire Guild." He cocked his head back to blink wholesome blue eyes at her and she just chuffed back a noise and threw his shirt at his chest in a fashion that made him almost laugh.

"I saved your life, you know?"

He nodded and smiled sincerely as he swung the shirt back onto his body, "I will never forget it."

She hated how easily he kept making her flush.

* * *

She found it hard to sleep at first, worrying her fingers into the cotton-like fabric of the over-sized shirt she'd found to sleep in. DG lolled her head back and forth on the pillow, trying to stretch her tensed and tight neck muscles while she sorted her thoughts.

First problems first…

Civil war. Okay, okay… So it wasn't there yet, but it seemed as though the O.Z. was teetering dangerously close to re-enacting the Redcoats and militia riot act here. There were options, political options, she was sure… but she knew they needed to re-organize and plot these things through. Sure, that was what her mother…

Her mother. Her parents.

Second (and third) problems second…

She didn't know exactly how to approach either of them. It wasn't as though she was unhappy to see them, but it was awkward to say the least. DG wasn't quite sure how to say, what to say, where to say…anything. She fidgeted her fingers on the shirt even harder, blinking her eyes closed as she heard the far off scuffling of men still moving in the hours past midnight. It wasn't going to be easy for her to interact with them.

And if it wasn't going to be easy for her, it was gonna be a thousand extra miles of hard road for Az.

Azkadellia was the one she actually felt some sort of connection to – but the snapping break the witch had made in her sister was like a trench between them and she wasn't any more comfortable trying to span it than she was trying to get homey with her parents.

The parents that sent her away… And the sister that she didn't know anymore.

The only people she was mostly comfortable with were the men that had been her recent companions. Even they weren't necessarily going to be able to help her when it came to her relationship with her family. Sure, they could guide her when it came to the Outer Zone and where to go from a winning battle in a suddenly possibly waging war… That didn't mean that they could sit down and Dr Phil her family…

She allowed herself the amusing image of them all sitting down together on set while Phil sorted their problems for them, of course commenting on the fact that she couldn't stop looking at shirtless Wyatt Cain like a tall glass of something-something to a desert-parched woman.

"Ugh." DG lifted both hands and made a growling noise into her palms, letting them cover most of her face as she tried to push away the image of him looking up at her from under his hat brim, shirt deliciously untucked and rumpled. "This is gonna suck."

* * *

Half of him wished that he'd asked Raw to knock him out once again because his own brand of sleep was nothing of the sort. He rucked the sheet lower on his waist and let both hands wipe up to his face, fingers rubbing against the bridge of his nose as he shook off the repetitive nightmare that had woken him again.

Always the same.

Over and over again.

Wyatt stood quickly, flashing the sheet off his still clothed legs before he realized that his feet were heading for the floor. He was up, half across the room before he realized he'd picked up the gun. And before he lifted the pistol to look at it, he realized he was crying.

Always the same.

Her screams and the mangled way she moaned out his name.

She'd begged him to save her.

He'd just watched.

He was in the center of an unknown room, the ruckus still roaring in the main area of the tower…but it was too still up here. Too quiet. Too perfectly untouched in this room. All it did was close him in and lock him in a rememory that wouldn't end. He could see the blood that formed perfect droplets of blinding red on the corner of her mouth. He could hear the wheezed and forced rattle of her breathing as her eyes squeezed shut against tears. He could hear his name…over and over again.

_Wyatt… please?_

"Cain?" this voice that shot his spine straight was much younger, much livelier. "Jesus, Cain…put it down."

He hadn't realized he'd locked the business end of the pistol in the divot of his chin, grinding it between the bones of his jaw.

"Wyatt…please?" DG's eyes were wider and brighter than Adora's had been, younger and while still mildly manic…calmer. More cautious and assured. Nearly as desperate, but not so resigned.

His princess, unlike his dead wife, was still hopeful.

Bless her for that misguided innocence…

He let the hand with the gun sink down by his hip. "I never follow through, Princess."

"I think suicide attempts call for names, not titles." She still hadn't moved and he thought he could smell the fear radiating off her, like a pack dog with a lead on something.

Cain let up a cynical half laugh, "If I was going to kill myself…baby, I woulda done it when that box opened up."

He angled his body away from her, showing her his bare back as he set the pistol back to the bedside table. He considered the bed and then considered the fact that she was still standing still and awkward behind him. Cain let his shoulders drop on a huff of suddenly embarrassed breath and turned his voice behind him.

"I'm sorry."

"I couldn't sleep."

The breathless way she said it seemed to mark the sudden change in conversation but he didn't mind at all. He took the way she was walking toward his window as a moment to rub the salt tears off his face, hand wiping down over his mouth.

He let his hands set to his hips as he noted the mostly comfortable way she leaned a shoulder against the window frame, "What do we do?"

His eyes dropped to her pale and lithe legs, brow arching at the flimsy shirt she'd apparently used for bedclothes, "Keep going."

DG nodded but it wasn't at him. She was thinking aloud, "I think Az should stay with my mother. She'll need the guidance. And Tutor can help her. We'll go with Ahamo."

"You and the mouse in your pocket?" he let a tone of teasing into his voice to lighten the awkward stillness that was still brooding between them.

She turned her wide blue eyes on him, arms tucked under her breasts as though she was cold or frightened, "I'm not wearing any."

He cocked his head at an angle and then shook it with a smirk, "I'd noticed, Princess."

"I hate that you call me that."

He smiled wider, "I love calling you that."

"Because I hate that you call me that?"

"You shouldn't be in here." He chided gently and breathed evenly through his nose.

DG turned slowly from the window and he watched her suddenly gain a few inches in height as she straightened and stepped toward him. Her hair was a damp wild mess and the dark tangle of it had a halo in the light from outside. It was beyond attractive to him and a sick feeling started in his stomach when he realized how much he liked looking at it.

His wife was dead.

But… she hadn't been dead all that long.

But…

"Cain?"

She'd been dead, over and over again, in his head for round on a decade.

"What?" he blinked his eyes up at her slowly, noticing how pale she was looking.

"Don't ever put that piece of metal to your head again," there was a gray tint of steel in her blue eyes. "Do you understand me?"

He didn't even blink, "Yes, Princess."

"Good night." She was already headed back for the door and he watched her leave without knowing why she'd even come.

"Good night, DG."

* * *

"Jesus Christ." She was shivering a hand against the wall outside of his room, trying to steady herself as she leaned into its coolness. Her stomach churned black tasting bile as she tried to shake the image of him out of her head.

Him and his fucking gun. Always with the gun.

The memory of it digging toward his throat as tears went crystal cut in his eyes and DG had to bend down against the wall to keep from losing the little food she had eaten. It was at least half an hour before she felt like she could safely walk from the doorway without hearing a shot echo behind her.

She didn't trust his promises.

She didn't trust anyone's.

He'd taught her that.

The guilt he felt on Adora's behalf was trap-laying a headache directly behind his eyes but he did his best to ignore it. Instead he tipped his head to the side, angling his jaw against the pillow, looking over the place she had been.

Not Adora, not his wife.

_Dead wife…she's dead, Wyatt._ _Face it._

He stretched flatter on his back, legs stretched out over the bedsheet instead of under it, studying the empty space that her short but delicately strong little body had been. He could still half see her there, the curly mess of waved dark hair, the glaring clean white of a dress shirt that had probably once belonged to her father. The way the hem of it had cut just half between the soft backs of her knees and the light little teasing curves of her -

"Stop it." He dug the heels of his palms against his closed eyes, forcing pain so that the guilt-ache flared red in the dark.

Even with his eyes closed he could still see the way each of her lithe arms tucked under barely covered breasts, just enough hint of a cleft between them to -

"Damn it." His fist punched down hard into the mattress beside him.

He opened his eyes to a dark room, staring at the ornately carved rails that soared up over the rarely used bed. He didn't try to stop himself this time when he imagined her laying still on a similar bed, eyes wide open as she stared at a shadowed ceiling and worried over everything the Zone had dropped into her small but capable hands. And before he could stop the thought he wondered how capable those hands were at other things.

Nearly a decade.

Annual, on annual, on annual of feeling nothing.

Not even desire.

He was suddenly surprised by the way lust felt. He'd barely remembered the sensory feel of it. Now it was tight in his thighs and his breathing had a rasping fire in his throat. Something was cinching in his chest and, damn it… He couldn't make it stop.

Not even Adora could stop it.

Not now.

"She's dead." He whispered quietly to the empty room and listened to the way it echoed.

Wyatt looked back to the empty window space again and allowed himself to recreate the soft swaying image DG had made while standing silent sentry to the suicidal Tin Man. He let his eyes sift closed but he could still see the vision of her in the dark, the way she'd turned and been so suddenly stolid and forthright.

Damn sexy is what she'd been… tousled and pretty and perfectly made in the shadows of his bedroom.

She'd entered, taken the room, been a part of it as though she'd belonged there.

As though she already owned the intimate space at his window, at his bedside.

He didn't stop the movement of his hands, a reminiscent throb in his right shoulder only vaguely reminded him of the mostly healed wound as he undid the clasp of his belt and worked open his pants. Cain sucked down a nervous breath and slid his hand against his length, fingers curving around it as he closed his eyes and saw her again. He swallowed against guilt, pressed his eyes tighter closed so that the red of the headache was fading black. His other hand jerked against his pants as he pulled himself free and just strokingly, softly, touched himself.

The heat of his hand and the dryness frustrated him and he considered running another bath but…it seemed like too much effort for something so ridiculous. And it seemed that the pain was dulling the roar of guilt that had sunken angry teeth into his head. He kept his movements slow and soft, head driven hard into the pillow while he kept his eyes squeezed shut.

There was a warmth and a certain earthy delicious smell to her that he had noticed while she'd lingered at his window. It seemed to hang in the air over him, like rainwater and maybe violets. Wyatt groaned into the slow and careful stroke of his hand, licking his bottom lip as he ran his thoughts over every inch of her that he could draw up in his head. Stubborn crown of dark hair to her small but quick feet, he already knew it all. His breathing hitched along with his hips and he finally worked a little fluid at the tip of his penis, groaning as he settled on the memory of her cocky smile.

He dug his hips down, biting on his own lip in an imaginary nip of hers while he started stroking harder. The damn smell of the girl was still lingering in the room and he couldn't from shallowly swallowing it down into his lungs as he rolled on the mattress. He put the free arm up, resting his body against his forearm and lifting up on his knees.

He couldn't stop seeing her under him.

He didn't want to stop.

Her smaller and softer and warmer hand working him raw instead of his own. Smirking at him while she teased. She had a perfect way of teasing him sometimes, confident, cocky, but true and honest. Always honest and right. Wyatt tightened his fingers, growling in frustration.

More.

He needed more of her.

He needed the too clean shirt half open and his mouth cradling slow down the valley between her breasts while he teased himself against her wetness. The moan she would offer him and the indignant punch in the arm when he pulled away from sliding into her. The laughter he'd let into her dark hair while she pulled him back between her trim legs. The slide of her tongue against his as he sank hard and tight into her…

He came faster than he'd expected, groaning as he bit down hard against his own forearm.

_Wyatt…please?_

Their voices were starting to echo together into one.

Evaporating into darkness as he sank flat against the messy sheets.

He didn't know if he was crying out of relief and release, or guilt and self hatred.

* * *

It was still dark, really, and Ahamo hadn't had near enough sleep to want to deal with any of the handfuls of problems they had waiting for them. He stretched to the side of the bed and felt it cool-cool empty. One of his hands rubbed up against his face as he heard the familiar cultured tones of his wife from the outer room of the suite they were resting in. He could hear her conversing with a man, no…two men at least. With a gulp of air he listened for a few moments, savoring the sound of her close by before he forced himself up from the mattress.

He dressed quickly in clothes that had been left in one of the chairs. He smirked at the old articles of clothing that reminded him of their long ago lives. Ahamo wiped his hair back before buttoning the shirt, eyes resting on the jacket she'd left for him. He shook his head minutely with a smile, knowing it was one of her old favorites. His hands were quick and confident as he slid on the jacket, buttoning it while more voices added from the other room.

He was rubbing at the scruff on his jaw, wishing he'd taken the time to shave as he entered the outer room. Lavender was fully dressed but her hair, grayed for years now, was long and loose down her back. She was speaking softly to the younger Cain, her voice quiet but firm while she gave the young man directions in a flowing voice. He'd learned to recognize the soothing and coddling tone that she'd once used with their girls.

Their girls…

If they were theirs anymore…

"Good morning." She barely lifted her head as she spoke, intently taking one of the scrolls that another resistance fighter was handing over to her. "There's some breakfast on the table for you."

"How much have I missed?" he asked as he bypassed the tray of fruits and reached for the coffee.

"Mister Cain - "

"Jeb." The young man corrected pleadingly.

"Jeb and I are already organizing the leftover men in defensive postures around the tower." She nodded his name with a placating smile before looking down at the paper she held, "The dead and wounded count is…high, but not as bad as it could have been."

"Tin Men should be recalled as soon as possible." Ahamo added while he poured steaming coffee into a chipped up cup. "The wounded need to be attended to."

"I'll have the elder Mr Cain recall the Tin Men as soon as I can re-instate him. Unless there is an argument I'll appoint him Captain." She nodded once at their following silence, "The wounded have already been taken to the main dining hall and they're receiving care."

Ahamo took a slow sip of hot and blessedly strong coffee, "Royal Guard?"

"Jeb is helping organize an internal guard." She gave the young man, awkwardly standing to her side, a soft smile. "If you could give me another report before we all meet?"

"Of course, ma'am." His pale eyes winced before he dipped his head. "Your majesty."

"Thank you." She nodded and stepped away from him and Ahamo watched the younger man deftly move from the room as quickly as possible.

Ahamo waited until the door clipped closed behind Jeb before letting up a bark of laughter, eyes on her serene face, "You just scared that boy out of three lives, my love."

There was still a sadness to the amused smile she returned, "He is very, very young."

"DG isn't much older." He murmured quietly.

"Dorothy is a Gale." Lavender answered sharply, "She's older than the Zone itself."

Ahamo just nodded as she turned back to the scroll she'd been handed, her usually clear eyes clouding as she read the report of the dead and wounded.


	2. Chapter 2

"I thought you might find these more comfortable."

Her older sister's voice carried a vibration of worry, uncomfortable and questioning. DG looked down at the fabric Azkadellia was offering and arched an eyebrow. She took it gently, knowing that her sister was mildly nervous in offering it to her.

In comparison, Az looked far closer to being a tried and true Princess of the Outer Zone. It made her slightly uncomfortable to look over the well fitting dress with a more modest bodice than what she'd seen the woman in days before. Her sister looked absolutely gorgeous, pinker color riding over her cheeks and hair looser than it had been. She'd always known Az was prettier than her, well, when she remembered her sister at all… It was just a shock to see the other woman's slow transformation back into what had been stolen from her.

"Whatcha got for me?" DG rifled a hand through the fabric.

"You seem to prefer pants." Azkadellia said gently and moved into the room. "And I can't say that I blame you at a time like this."

"Pants are normal on the Other Side." DG shrugged and looked over the black riding pants her sister had found. A loose fitting white shirt that would billow slightly off her small frame sat on top of them.

"Um…"

Az lifted a pair of flat bottomed black boots. "I wasn't sure of size."

DG reflexively gave her a wide smile and took them, moving with ease into the bathroom. She left the door cracked slightly while she changed her clothes, trying to finger pry the knots from her hair at the same time with brisk movements.

"How long have you been awake?"

"I didn't sleep well last night." Her sister confessed in the same quieted and worrisome tone of voice. "A few hours, maybe."

"Me too." DG admitted and found underclothes tucked between the pants and shirt. She dressed as quickly as possible. "You okay, Az?"

"Do me the kindness of defining 'okay'?" her sister's voice was barely rising above a whisper and DG stepped easily back into the bedroom area, carrying the boots with her toward the bed.

She didn't have an answer.

And, really, her sister wasn't looking for one…

Azkadellia's head was bent at a downward angle, her hair trickling down each shoulder while she stared at her open hands, both of them laying with palms up in her lap. DG sat gently to the rumpled mattress and let her shoulder barely press into Azkadellia's. The older woman didn't move at all, just continued to stare hard at her empty hands. DG lifted her foot and slowly slid one of the boots on, wiggling her toes in it before pulling on the other as well. She stood quickly and bounced to be sure they fit, startling her sister's gaze back up.

"Your hair is getting lighter." The younger of the two whispered in mild surprise, crooking a finger tip against a wave of Az's hair. The black quality had started to soften toward a light brown highlight.

"Really?"

DG had to smile as those too-still hands broke from their stupor and lifted, tugging a lock forward. "Really."

"Like mother's?"

DG shook her head with a smile, "No. Like your own and not the witch's."

There was a sweet flush of color on the other woman's cheeks that DG hadn't remembered seeing ever before.

* * *

"Guess I shouldna pissed on your memorial plaque, eh?"

Wyatt grinned widely at the familiar voice that gruffed behind him, "I have a memorial plaque?"

"Sure." The older man clapped a large hand on his shoulder as he stepped forward, knocking the former Tin Man's hat jauntily to the side, "Right next to the public toilets."

He turned slowly into the way the larger man was hovering against his right shoulder, drawing his glance from the trucks that were drawing supplies deeper into Central City's fortified area. He caught the way the other Tin Man's face had cragged and aged, the sun darkening it toward weathering. Cain cocked his head at the pounds the older man had added in the middle and shook his glance up to jovial green eyes.

"Hays." He opened both arms for a hug that damn near cracked his back.

"Cain." The other man clapped his full palm against the blonde's back. "I thought you were dead."

"I was for awhile." Wyatt separated slowly from his old comrade.

"Your kid told me." The older, darker man admitted quietly. "Called me in at the ass crack of dawn…you don't look a day older."

"Technically I'm only about a week older, I suppose." Wyatt shifted his hat back down against his forehead. "Still wearing tin?"

"Nobody is, really." The other officer shrugged but tugged his jacket lapel to the side, flashing a familiar badge from tight against his shirt. "Not officially. I'm assuming we get to see the Queen this morning? Can't wait."

There was a teasing fire in the other man's eyes, excitement brimming up into them as he smiled. Wyatt couldn't help but return it with half a grin before turning back to the way trucks were starting to slow and stall into a line behind each other. He shook his head and whistled loudly, using the same high pitched tone he'd used when Jeb was fishing too far down the creek line. His son's head snapped around and the darkness in Jeb's eyes was a sudden and soundless crack between them.

"Keep them moving, Jeb. Don't let 'em idle." He called out with as supportive a tone as possible, hoping to gentle things between them.

"I got it." The younger man answered flatly and turned away.

Hays let off a wheezing and whistling sound behind him, "Kid's all spit."

"Yeah," Cain frowned slightly, "I'd noticed."

* * *

"They're really beautiful when they're all together, aren't they?"

Cain rolled his eyes away from the other man and avoided looking up in the direction Glitch was staring. He sighed against the way the former advisor had a way of stating the bleeding obvious and nodded into the coffee cup he was holding tight to his chest. He shrugged his shoulders in the starched clean shirt, astounded that the pain in his right shoulder had washed into just a miniscule ache.

"I mean…" Glitch sighed, "Royally beautiful."

"I get it." Cain could feel his throat constrict. "Thank you."

"Easy, Cain." The darker of the two banked him a glare, "I wouldn't want you to have an emotional response to anything. I was just making an observation."

"Observe something else, wouldja?"

Wyatt finally looked up to where the three women of the Gale line were already embroiled in what looked to be a blistering conversation. Surprisingly it was his little spitfire that was holding her own against the Queen while Azkadellia watched the two of them quietly. He smiled as the older sister had to softly speak between them to calm the jangling of nerves and DG's head turned sharply to the side while her arms crossed under her breasts again.

"Careful, Cain." Glitch nudged against the blonde's upper arm. "It's showing again."

"What?" he cast a sidelong glance toward Glitch, voice defensive.

Glitch grinned knowingly, "That. Exactly that."

He watched the other man step swiftly backwards, finger pointed at him. "Keep walking, Zip."

* * *

He watched the three of them, suddenly surprised by the striking way that they really did look alike. When all of Azkadellia's witch trappings were stripped away she really was a soft and gentle looking lady, nearly as elegant as her mother. The Queen's eyes were far more steeled and stern though, the color of them nearly disconcerting in her determined visage. Both of them had their hair up and plaited back but DG… He couldn't block the smirk that tugged up one corner of his mouth.

She damn well looked the part of stubborn second princess, waved dark hair full and soft around her face.

It didn't help that she'd yet to stop wearing that furiously obstinate look on her usually wide open face. Or that her arms were still defensively tight across her chest. He didn't remember her making that movement all that often before they'd met back up with her parents. And while the night before he'd found it enticing… it was mildly upsetting now that she felt the need to withdraw.

That wasn't his DG.

Certainly wasn't the girl that had haughtily reminded him that she'd been the one to let him out of a tin-box-prison.

He didn't like the change.

He didn't plan to let it stick around.

* * *

Ahamo had made the rounds, asking people to take seats where they could find them around the large dining table. It was the largest protected place that they could locate and get cleaned up in time for a meeting like this. He'd sorted it out hours before and there was food and drink laid upon the table – not much, but enough to help comfort those that had been called in to strategize.

There were quite a few faces that he didn't recognize but knowing the men in the room, he was fairly certain that no one was here that didn't need to be. He flicked a smile and a nod to Lavender as people started sitting around the rectangular table. He stepped back slowly, letting his hands clasp behind his back as he leaned his steps toward his youngest, and obviously unhappy, child.

"You should sit, Dorothy." He murmured into one ear as he stepped around behind her, taking a place closer to the Queen's chair, "Your mother wants to hear your suggestions."

"She didn't five minutes ago." DG replied quietly, shoulders tensing after the use of her full first name.

"This isn't easy for any of us, DG. It's a necessary evil." He murmured softly, giving her a sidelong glance of pleading. "Please sit down."

She didn't sit beside her mother, but instead found a place nestled between her older sister and the Queen's former advisor.

* * *

He certainly didn't mean to stop paying attention to the current discussion but the politics of a delegation to the Guild wasn't nearly interesting enough to keep him from noticing the way that Azkadellia was squeezing tight to her younger sister's wrist atop the table. DG's other hand crossed away from her water glass to rub the other woman's fingers, both of them staring off to his left.

Cain followed their glance to where Jeb and his old friend were sitting. It certainly wasn't Jeb they were staring agape at because he was too busy softly responding to the Queen's request for information on the Guild's whereabouts. Cain looked beyond his son to find Jonah Hays glaring in quiet fury at Azkadellia and he shifted slightly. He looked back to the sisters and noted the uncomfortable pleading glance that DG was aiming to him. Wyatt breathed in through his nose and looked to his palm against the table, fingers spread flat.

"Excuse me." He said softly once. No one broke the conversation and when he looked back up DG's face was starting to darken in defensive anger.

Cain flexed his fingers, staring at his ring before he made a thoughtless decision and slammed his palm flat and hard to the wooden table, startling everyone. "Excuse me."

There was silent confusion in the Queen's eyes but she tipped her head in cautious permission.

"Hays," he didn't look to his friend but kept his eyes on DG's bright blues. "Leave the table."

"Wyatt - "

"I'll speak with you later." His voice made no allowance for argument and he still didn't risk looking away from DG when Ahamo seemed to suddenly appear from behind his wife to stand behind Azkadellia's chair. "Leave this table."

"I think we all need a break." Ahamo's hands were white-knuckling the back of his oldest daughter's chair while the other Tin Man roughly and loudly scraped his chair across the stone flooring.

"I agree." Cain murmured and noted the way DG was breathing easier, her lips parting slightly in relief.

She mouthed a sweet-lipped-silent 'thank you' that he wasn't going to forget until his brain went soft with age and senility.

Or until someone put a bullet in it.


	3. Chapter 3

"Thank you."

She was too damn close.

Why did she have to get so close?

"Don't." he lifted a hand behind him before rubbing it against his chin as she followed tight to him into the empty back hall. "Don't thank me."

DG frowned in confusion when he spun around, halting both their steps quickly. She'd had to stop sharply before nipping his heels and tipping directly into his broad chest. Her eyes lifted to follow the way he let the hand fling off his jaw, slap into the stone wall and stay there. The other hand set his jacket back off his hip while he turned his fingers against the trim edge of his vest.

"Don't thank me." His eyes were brooding dark, looking like a lake before a squall.

"What you just did - "

"I shouldn't have done." He hissed his voice quieter. "I've known that man longer than you've been alive. He's saved my life a dozen times more than you have, DG."

The use of her first name threw her suddenly.

"You helped Az, Cain." She whispered at the sudden guilty way his voice scuttled between them.

"I didn't do it for Az." He snapped and dropped his eyes away from her, fingers roving up his vest to rub against the bridge of his nose. "Damn it… I should have done it for her."

"Cain." She tried to calm him with a soothing hand but he jerked his head up at the movement she aimed between them.

His hand was swift and untrackable, brooking the space between them so that his fingers curled tight and intense against her thinner wrist. His body leaned intently forward so that she moved into the wall and sucked down a breath at the way he was pressing her back. Her eyes swiftly moved from his fingers curling her wrist at an angle and on up to the way he was looking down over her. His perfectly curved lips were parted enough that she could see his tongue snake against the lower one. He was looking over her face and hair like he'd never once seen her up close before.

She hadn't had a man look at her like that in awhile…

It was oddly surprising and yet, ultimately comfortable that it was him doing the looking.

"I didn't do it for Azkadellia." He whispered down over her, angling his face closer to her fingers. Close enough that his jaw line feather-touched against them. "I did it for you. Because of you."

"And?" she edged her chin up a bit, daring him to say something that would lay out his sudden flare of frustration.

He answered as he pulled away from her reaching fingers, "That's the wrong reason to do the right thing, Princess."

* * *

She watched the pent energy of his body bandy and uncoil as he walked away, shoulders tense as he put more force into his steps than usual. He stalked quickly back toward the dining hall and DG finally allowed her hand to lower from the lifted position he'd had it in.

"Stubborn jackass." She let her spine slide flat against the wall while she rubbed against her wrist where his scalding fingers had been. "Condescending stubborn jackass!"

Her correction carried intentionally louder down the hall and she heard the dining hall door slam in response.

* * *

"She shouldn't be in there."

"Princess Azkadellia should be." Wyatt lifted an angry hand between them, offended by the man's assertion. "What's left of her, anyhow. Your anger can walk off."

"You're one to talk." Hays batted the other man's hand from in front of him in annoyance. "My anger? Double suns couldn't light up brighter than your face right now, Cain. What the hell is going on?"

"Nothing."

"You got a thing for her?" Jonah's eyes slimmed. "For that witch?"

"The witch is dead." Wyatt murmured back and shook his head, "And no. Not at all."

Hays glared at him and skirted his fingers to the bottom of his vest, aiming to shift it lower on his body and faltering. "You've got something to sort out, Wyatt. I suggest you get to it."

"Hays - "

"She killed my son." There was a shade of black nothing in the other man's normally green hued eyes. "You thought yours was dead? Well I had the bloody proof with mine."

"I'm sorry, Jonah." He shook his head minutely, "I didn't… I'm sorry."

"I'll make an apology to the Queen." Hays murmured.

"You will." Cain nodded gently, "But you're not going back in that room."

"Wyatt - "

"I mean it."

The two of them squared against each other for a moment but he didn't back down, eyes holding his friend's darker hued glance stolidly. Instead of saying any more he merely lifted his hat and set it onto his head, turning his back to his friend without a worry that blows would come between them. He started to step away but Jonah's voice stalled him a few steps to the door.

"I need my orders, then."

Cain breathed in slowly through his nose. "I'll lobby to split the royal family up. I need travel arrangements made for all of them, please."

"What kind?"

"Make sure two trucks are held for them." Cain glanced back, "Non-descript."

Hays nodded and started to step away but he stopped the larger man, "Jonah."

"Yeah?"

"I'll be in whichever one Azkadellia isn't and I'm not telling you which one is which." He felt the sudden sting of his friend's glance as he understood the implication. "Don't kill me because you get stupid, understand?"

Jonah's green eyes thinned even farther, his skin going pale, "I wouldn't."

"I had to say it." Wyatt turned back toward the door, "I'm sorry."

* * *

Az watched her younger sister pace the opposite side of the room, one of DG's hands bent awkward against her slim hip while the other tapped light fingers along her bottom lip. She couldn't quite tell what was bothering the younger woman but she'd returned livid in comparison to the grateful way she had left the dining hall.

"Are you all right?" She nearly jumped at her father's quiet voice but held herself still instead as he sat gently beside her.

Azkadellia bent her head slightly forward, eyes still on DG's movements. "As well as I can be right now… he hated me."

"He hates what your face once represented." Ahamo said softly and followed his older daughter's glance toward his younger. "That is not your fault."

"It isn't hers either." Az murmured gently and watched DG stop suddenly still, both her hands setting to her hips as she glared across the room.

Azkadellia turned her head and watched as Cain strolled back into the room in a much more composed manner than he had left it, either time. His shoulders were squared back confidently and he was pulling off his hat with a languid movement. She let her eyes trip over the smug way he was smiling at the table, avoiding her sister's glance entirely. Az just shook her head and looked back to the way DG's eyes had widened expressively.

"We aren't safe here." She whispered as she looked back to her father. "None of us are."

"I know, darling." Ahamo inclined his head, watching as Cain moved around the table and sat across from him. "We're leaving soon."

* * *

"Jeb has recalled most of Central City's Tin Men," Lavender spoke evenly and without inflection, knowing that both the Cain men were jittery beside each other. "Mr Cain, I'm inclined to re-instate you as the new Captain. If you were to stay - "

"Thank you, your Majesty," he blatantly interrupted her, "but no."

"Mr Cain - "

"I'm not a Tin Man anymore." He avoided everyone's glance, fingers stretching flat to the table.

"Where you've been for the last ten years doesn't change my opinion of your abilities, Wyatt." She intentionally softened her voice. "You're one of the only men I would trust to re-organize this city."

"With all due respect," he finally lifted blue eyes to hers. "No, thank you."

"I agree." DG's voice was strong and clear and it had been nearly half an hour since she had said anything at all. "Mister Cain would be better put to use leading the Royal Guard."

Lavender cast a discriminating glance between the two of them and leaned back in her seat. She breathed in through her nose, knowing that she was being publicly harangued into keeping the two of them together out of emotional attachment. It didn't help her pride that her youngest did have a valid point and was sure to support it with sound reasoning. Cain was a better body guard now than a policeman. And he was unendingly loyal to her family, even in Azkadellia's case. He'd been the one to make the move they'd all wanted to make. He'd been the one to rescue both her children at once.

She turned her eyes slowly to her consort and caught the quizzical way that Ahamo was glancing between his daughter and the former Tin Man, surprise on his face. "You agree with them?"

"I…" Ahamo nodded slowly, "I do. To be honest I would prefer he stay with the girls. He's already more than proven himself."

There was a sudden half huff of laughter from the man they were considering, "I'm still here."

Azkadellia spoke up suddenly. "There isn't a soldier in this rebellion I trust more to protect me or Dorothy."

"Thank you." Cain murmured quietly to the older of the sisters and finally spared a glance toward DG.

She was staring at him in a fashion that broke the earlier frustration he'd been keeping pent in his shoulders. There was pride on her face and it tweaked the guilt that was still aching behind his eyes. There was no reason for her to be so proud of what he considered non-accomplishments and happy accidents of fate – and yet… The smile on her lips turned higher as he cocked his head in a half apology, blinking his lids low over bright eyes.

She was proud of him.

She was looking at him in the same confident way his wife once had.

It broke the ice of self degradation from his chest, cracking open the cold so that he flexed his palm closed and met her eyes again with a warm smile.

"I'll stay." Jeb offered into the brief awkward silence. "I'll stay in Central City."

"Jeb." The tentative smile Cain had been wavering in DG's direction dropped instantly and he side-glanced to his son. "Don't."

"He's earned the title." Ahamo spoke slowly. "More than."

"I'm not a Tin Man." He shrugged his shoulders quickly, "But I can do what I have to. It's no different than what I have been doing, really."

Lavender eyed the younger of the Cain men quietly, noting that the fear and frustration that radiated off the father did not at all sway the younger man's determination. Jeb only looked back at her quietly, ignoring the way Wyatt was staring at him. She leaned her palm toward her consort, hand up and open and waiting for the tin star that Ahamo pulled from his pocket and dropped into her hand.

"It's not just a piece of metal, Mr Cain." She was obviously speaking to Jeb. "This is peace in the Outer Zone."

"I know, your Majesty." He still didn't waver.

"Then I trust you." She placed the tin star across the table in front of him, watching the hesitation in his hand. "You'll take the oath before you leave this table, Mr Cain."

Jeb just nodded as he clutched the star points into his palm and avoided the fury of crystalline blue in his father's eyes.

* * *

He was piecing through the food that was laid out over the table, watching as people milled through another break. Glitch amiably nabbed a piece of fresh fruit and started chewing on it quietly, sighing into the sweetness of it. A hand at his elbow stuttered his reverie and he looked up to find Cain's blue eyes fuming over him.

"I didn't do it."

Wyatt just softened his face and nodded, "I need your help, Glitch."

"Sure." The darker of the two nodded and took another bite.

"I sent Jonah out to settle two trucks for the royal family to travel in."

Glitch frowned at the other man and stopped chewing instantly, speaking around a piece of fruit. "Cain…why would you - "

"They won't be in them." Wyatt lifted a finger between them. "But you're the only other person that knows that, yeah?"

A sudden understanding grin perked the former advisor's lips and he chomped happily on his fruit, "Diversion. Got it."

Wyatt put his hand back to Glitch's elbow and drew him slowly in the direction of DG and Azkadellia. He smiled wide to both the young woman while Glitch continued to eat happily. DG's face was, at first, passive as she looked over the two of them. A flick of frustration pinched between her eyes as she caught Cain's glance and then washed away quickly. He knew he was going to have to pay for what had happened earlier but he wasn't prepared yet. Instead, he dove past it, hoping avoidance might save him.

"Ladies, Glitch is going to start loading some of your things into our travel vehicles." He pressed his hand full and flat to Glitch's back. "Do me the favor of letting him know what you can spare to leave here. I'd rather we travel light."

* * *

"Jeb." He whistled low and long through the room as he aimed his head toward one of the exit doors.

His son hesitated only briefly before lifting his shoulders higher to make himself taller and Wyatt smiled knowingly at the stubbornly born action, yanking the door open. He waved his son into the hall before following and shutting the door behind him, allowing his back to press flat against it.

"I'm not gonna fight about this."

"Neither am I." the older man said blankly. "You made a choice. You think it's the right one. We'll discuss it when Central City is locked down."

Jeb stared at him in silent confusion, the reflection of Adora's eyes squinting up.

"I need you to help me." Wyatt let his hand tug at his son's elbow.

"Where are we going?"

Cain gave a small smirk, "The stables."

"Dad." Jeb tried to stall their quickening steps.

"Honestly, kid." He shook his head and looked back, a shaky hand lifting to tap the star that had been pinned on his child's chest. "You're a Tin Man now. Don't let another man question what you believe is right."

"Okay."

"That's not to say that I'm not damn pissed at you," Wyatt was suddenly directly in front of his son, eyes hardening, "But it can wait until we figure this out. Understood?"

Jeb just pursed his lips tight and cocked his head before responding, "Yeah, sure."

"Let's go."

* * *

"You're gonna be late for this meeting, Princess."

The curl of his fingers on her hips didn't frighten her so much as make her back arch and tingle. His husked voice had skated down the line of her spine, making her shoulders tighten back into the way he was nearly curling around her from the back. DG caught the way her father watched silently and discerningly as Cain ducked her out into the hall again, his fingers starting to dig on her hips. She tested her trust in him after their argument and leaned back as he reached forward to close the door before them. The lay of her back against his chest was a better fit than she expected and she was pleasantly surprised when he didn't move. It seemed that he was more concerned with something else, too occupied to still stay angry.

He was leaning just as far forward as she was back. "I want to explain everything to you."

"Everything?" DG let her head cradle back into his collarbone, forcing him to cock his jaw against her hair. He smelled of soap and leather and musk and…something farm-like. Maybe straw? It didn't matter. It was deliciously comforting.

"Hays thinks he's manning those trucks for your family." One of Cain's hands moved up against her arm, opposite the side of his hushed voice. "Glitch is stuffing them full up of the things you don't actually need. If I can still trust Jonah, we have nothing to worry about. Otherwise, it's a fitting diversion."

She just nodded, feeling the constant thump of his heartbeat against her shoulder blade, lulled by the slow and easy rhythm of it and his breathing. The hand that had lifted to her upper arm rubbed the thin sheer-like fabric of her shirt into muscle, his thumb making the movement soothing and constant. He still hadn't moved the other hand.

"But?"

"But you and your family are meeting Jeb in the stables." His voice angled farther into the crook of her neck. "He's going to split you up while I take one of the trucks."

"Cain - "

"Shhh." He crooned the sound the way he used to comfort Jeb after a skinned knee. "I'm gonna be fine, DG. Let your mother take Az through the Papay. You and your father split and head for the Unwanted. I'll meet you there."

"My parents know?"

"You're going to bring them through here and to the back gate next break." His tone had turned slow and warm, breath ruffling and muffling in her hair. "This politicking is taking far too long."

"I agree. My mother isn't going to - "

She tried to turn to face him but his hands stopped her tightly, his jaw digging down onto her shoulder while his breathing stalled, "Zero's loose."

He felt her body clinch back against his and it was nervous and unchecked reflex that made him curl tighter around her. The palm that had been curling her hip flattened out slightly as he made another hushing noise. He could see the way her hand shook as she wiped at her mouth, eyes still staring down the shut door that blocked them from the rest of their companions.

"How do you know?"

"Jeb had a scout check it out." He whispered. "Came back an hour ago."

"Don't go alone." She didn't expect him to listen, whether she phrased it pleadingly or as a demand. He'd been working this plan in his head for hours now, maybe since the middle of the night. Either way, he wasn't going to budge. Not when he thought he was doing the right thing by her and her family.

"Why so worried?" the tease in his voice was a comfort after the abrupt way he had spoken to her earlier.

"Because you're being sweet to me. It's unnatural." DG angled back sharply, letting an elbow jerk toward his stomach.

The flashed movement of his hands had her drawn back tight and locked against his chest, fingers gripping her still so that she couldn't complete the playful drawback of her arm. DG froze as he used his jaw to moved her hair away from her neck, feeling the tightening of her skin as he breathed heat against her throat. Wyatt considered the weight of the moment, looking down over the way her chest had drawn up at the brush of his breathing on her skin. He took a brief glimpse down her shirt and slipped his eyes closed with a guilty but pleased smile.

This was the gun draw.

It was kill or be killed.

"I haven't even begun being sweet to you, Princess." To her credit, she sank her head back into his shoulder when he faintly kissed her throat.

She fought to free a hand and he let her loose her fingers, waiting for her to force him away from her in rejection, open mouth hovering over the damp spot he'd left against her throat. Wyatt relaxed his breathing when instead she lifted two fingertips against his cheek, angling him back closer to her neck. He kissed against her again, knowing it was the absolute wrong time to be manhandling the princess that he'd just been appointed to protect. When she whimpered from the way he sucked against her skin, he didn't give a damn what was proper.

"Please do what Jeb tells you to do." He whispered the words against the light red mark he'd left on her. "I'll find you."

"Don't go alone." She let a little beg into her tone this time.

He lifted his head enough to look over the scared set of her face, lips breaking against her cheekbone. "I won't be alone."

"Are you saying goodbye?" DG turned her head abruptly, eyes widened in sudden fear that he was giving her something to remember. "Cain?"

He smirked at her and squeezed tighter against her before aiming his mouth to her ear and hushing his voice, "Sweetheart, if this was goodbye I'd take you rough against that door first. Get me?"

"Don't lie to me." She tried to kiss him but he drew his mouth back to block her movements. "Don't go alone."

Wyatt just tapped the tip of her nose, forcing confusion into her eyes, "I won't be alone."

"I don't understand you." She murmured as he pushed her to step back to the door. "You were angry with me because - "

"DG," he breathed her name softly and he reached around her for the door, turning the handle but not yet pulling, "I'm trying. There's miles for every one of us to go."

She added her hand to his in resignation and pulled against the door, opening it wide enough for her to slip back into the meeting quietly. Her head turned back so that she could face him. He caught the way she searched his face briefly, eyes meeting his with full bright blue force. She could feel the way he leaned closer but stopped just before the line of the door, keeping him in shadows from the rest of the dining hall.

"Rough against a door, huh?" a half smirk tipped up one side of her mouth. "You're a dirty old man, Mr Cain."

"Older." He corrected and caught her wrist. "Listen to Jeb."

DG nodded, "Don't go alone."

"I'll find you." He used the other hand to shift a wave of dark hair over the placed he'd marked her, lust and pride pitting low in his gut at the physical show of intimate possession. "Believe me."

She just smiled weakly at him before turning her body fully through the door, sweeping it quietly closed behind her.


	4. Chapter 4

He was ignoring the thunking noise the truck was making as he steered it into an uphill turn, pretending he didn't know that the axle was grunting its annoyance at him. Instead he just turned the plan over in his thoughts again, not realizing he was humming something in a quiet vibration of his throat.

If she'd listened to him…and realized that was quite the debatable 'if'… she and her father would be somewhere near the entrance to the Realm of the Unwanted. And if, another questionable turn, Raw had done what he'd asked of only him before climbing into one of the two trucks, Azkadellia and the Queen would already be safe within the geographical lines of the Viewers' tribe. And, were they to be caught and questioned, DG or Ahamo would both assume that the rest of their family was in Runners territory. And if Jonah was still loyal, then the other truck would be jauntily making its halfway mark to Finaqua. Otherwise…Cain was just idly waiting for the ambush.

It was a whole lot of 'if' laying about in his thoughts and it made him uncomfortable.

He gunned the engine of the truck and rubbed his hand against his bottom lip in thoughtful distraction.

* * *

"Oh, yay." DG drew the Pinto painted horse to an uneasy stop, shifting her body as the young horse pranced in excitement beside the entrance to the Realm of the Unwanted. "Back down the hole in search of the white rabbit."

"Alice in Wonderland." Ahamo smiled as his eyes lit with recognition, rearing his own horse to an easier stop. "God, I haven't thought about that story in years."

"The story? I meant Jefferson Airplane." She smirked as she lifted a hand from the reigns, waving a finger at her biological father.

"When logic and proportion have fallen sloppy dead," he quoted with a sing song tone, jacking his body easily down off the horse. "And the white knight is talking backwards…"

DG liked the calmly comforting lull of his voice as he hummed the next few bars of the song, hands up to help her down from the still excitable pony. She liked the way the boots Az had given her padded easy into the grass and she stepped back once to regain her balance and stretch her lower back. She put a softly patting hand to the horse's side, giving him a scratch before looking back to the man before her. After a deep breath she bent and latched the handle to the door in her fingers, jerking it up hard.

"Remember what the dormouse said." She waved down into the trapdoor and smirked when he bowed a 'ladies first'. DG let him take the door and then jerked her hair back and tied it tight with a strap of something she'd found in the stables, knowing she'd need to get the mess of soft darkness off her face.

"Feed your head." She murmured to the way Ahamo was smirking at her and started down the ladder that she'd, unfortunately, been down before.

* * *

Glitch didn't really like the fact that he'd been left behind, but he understood the Tin Man's reasoning. Nervously he continued piling some of the royal family's belongings, the things they had actually wanted, into the back of one of the Guild's wagons. The annoying little munchkins were hovering too close, poking through things without respect or reason.

"Hey." He slapped quickly at the hand of one of the Guild Members, rolling his eyes at the sudden defensive posture the diminutive man aimed at him. "Leave your grubby hands off, bat nugget."

He stepped back around the end of the wagon quickly to avoid the growling way the Guild-ling stabbed a spear toward him. As he moved back toward the entrance of the palace he ducked his hand into his pocket, drawing out the watch that Cain had clipped to his vest before climbing into a rickety black truck. Glitch flipped open the pocket watch, eyeing the emerald that sparked in the double sunlight at him, checking its safety again.

He sighed in comfort at the sight of it and snapped it closed, head high as he entered the shadow of the tower.

* * *

"I can't feel your father's heat anymore."

Azkadellia's head snapped up from the food she was picking through slowly. There was a sudden flurry of emotion in her eyes as the Queen spoke for the first time in more than and hour. Lavender realized, from the shock-white fear on her daughter's face, that she hadn't phrased it properly.

"No." she reached over to Azkadellia's now shaking fingers, "Darling, no. I just mean that he's not in the open of the Zone anymore. He's shielded himself somehow. Or he's entered the Unwanted."

"I thought - "

"No, Azkadellia." The older woman's fingers stroked against her hair. "I'm sorry to frighten you."

Az shook her head down and slowly pulled her fingers from the soothing touch of her mother. She tried not to make the movement offensive and so gently set the plate aside. She had barely made any headway with the food on it, her stomach already roiling in agitation.

"Use the emerald." The Queen offered a sweet and supportive smile. "It will help you feel the same sorts of things."

"I gave it to Wyatt." Azkadellia said softly, knowing the reaction she would be looking up into.

Lavender's eyes were a sudden gray fury, but a controlled anger rang in her voice. "You…why?"

"He asked for it." Azkadellia's voice was a whisper but she put her shoulders back taut, forcing herself stronger. "I trust him."

"You trust someone that you haven't known for more than a few days?" Lavender was suddenly quite interested in the way her oldest was defending herself. It was a positive force in the girl's current quietude. "Tell me why."

"I don't know." Az glanced back down to her hands. "He…"

"You like him?" Lavender questioned softly. "You find him attractive?"

"No." Az shook her head abruptly in frustration before looking up, "It's not like that. He is attractive, but…he's noble while flawed. Like DG. He can be right while having been wronged."

"I'm not as sure as you are." Lavender said and glanced over her own plate of uneaten food before looking across the rustic cabin to wear two Viewers were speaking outside the open doorway.

Azkadellia looked back to her hands, thinking about the way he hand cupped both his hands over hers as she held the emerald to him. "He promised to bring it to Fanaqua."

"And you believe in promises?" there was a nudge of conflict in her mother's voice.

"I have to now." Azkadellia spoke intently and slowly. "I don't have much else to rely on at the moment."

Her mother was thoughtfully silenced and she was certainly thankful for it.

* * *

"I'm telling mom." DG murmured as she watched the scantily clad waitress roll her hips as she stalked away from the dinged up wooden table. Ahamo coughed a laugh into his water-spotted glass, shaking his head.

He swallowed hard and used the other hand to wave his fingers between them, "I could make the same threat."

DG glanced at him in confusion, letting both her elbows lean heavily upon the table before she picked at some sort of meat dish. "No worries, Ace. She's not my type."

"No," Ahamo set down the glass, sparkling her a teasing glance, "You like 'em rugged and grumpy. With hats."

DG looked up at him in thudding silence.

"And old." He added with a cocked head. "And cocky. And probably dumber than a box of rocks."

"It's not going to work." She shook her head with a knowing smile.

"What?" Ahamo's grin lit his eyes in a way that made her feel more comfortable being near him. He was having fun with her. They were making a friendship happen without forcing the familial aspect.

"I'm not going to defend him to you." DG popped a piece of meat into her mouth and chewed stubbornly.

"Why not?" her father asked, "You don't think he deserves it?"

"I think you're fishing with a lackluster lure." She arched a brow at him. "And it's not like there's actually anything going on."

"Denial." He lifted his hand and thumped it amiably onto the table in a manner that had her questioning whether it was really just water in his glass. "There it is."

"Mmm." DG nodded and shrugged into his teasing, "You got me. He's having my baby."

Ahamo chuckled brightly and leaned back in his seat, letting his elbows skirt onto the worn down arms of the hand-made chair. He rolled his head back and forth in amused wonderment. His glance skated over her face and down her red-flushed neck and then back up to stern blue eyes. She looked a lot like her mother and it made him smile wistfully for the wife he'd only had back one night.

"The man marked my daughter." His jaw flicked tight and then loosened as he leaned forward once again, "And then handed her back to me while he ran off."

"You have no right to judge him." DG's voice was plain and cool.

"You're correct." He murmured back as he nodded and fished a piece of roasted meat off her plate. "I haven't been much of a hands on father, have I? It's not my place to make judgments on the men you let that close to you. You're a grown woman."

"You're making my argument for me."

"I'm not arguing, darling." He chewed on the food thoughtfully. "I'm not passing judgment."

"You like him?"

"I neither like," he lifted his glass again, "nor dislike."

DG's confusion was quiet between them.

"I don't know him," he sighed, "any better than I know my own child at the moment."

"I know him better than I know the you at this table." She whispered in a sadly agreeing response, "I remember you in images. Like memory movies."

"And besides those memories, I don't know a you without a him." His sullen assertion rang truth in her head and she could do nothing but listen to the echo of it while she stared down at her plate.

"I'm not hungry anymore."

Ahamo stared at the crown of her head, resisting the urge to stroke her hair in a comforting motion, "Me either."

* * *

He'd circled back twice into the darkness of night fall before finally parking the wheezing and thumping truck a fair two miles from the entrance to the Realm of the Unwanted. It was fair to say that he'd gun out of gas fumes about midway down the hill and left off coasting to a rolling and guttering stop. Cain shut it off and sat for a moment, staring into the darkness before a thumping from the back caught his attention.

"Yeah," he felt his throat rasp after not speaking for hours. "I'm coming, baby girl."

Cain launched himself from the cab of the truck, reaching back to grab his hat and leaving the door hanging open while he tugged it on and headed round to the back. His hand itched along the line of his holster, checking his pistol while he rounded the truck. He jerked the latch on the back of the door and swung it open, grinning at the chuffing noise the white mare gave him as she stared wide eyed at him from the back. He crooned apology and bent the outsides of his knuckles against the sweep of her long nose while the other hand undid the roping that kept her tied up.

"You're my promise." He murmured as the mare nudged at his scratching fingers. "Huh, sweetheart?"

She just gave him a weighed neighing noise of approval as he slowly stepped her down from the back of the truck, eyes watching her legs for any sign that she'd gone lame during the ride. She pranced restlessly beside him and Cain gave her nose another scratch before he moved his hand along her side, stepping to the back of the truck to haul out the saddle.

"Don't go alone." He scoffed what DG had last said to him as he shook his head with mild amusement.

* * *

"Not tired?" Kalm's voice startled her slightly and Az looked up from where she was sitting on a spare rigged mat.

She just shook her head negatively and watched the young Viewer move into the hut-like building entirely, the brightness of a fire outside the door highlighting his slow and cautious movements. He looked over her a moment and when he was pleased by whatever it was he was thinking he stepped closer to her.

"Not tired either." He shook his head and sat on the mud-packed floor, offering up what she could only imagine was some sort of toy.

Az took it carefully, studying the wooden frame and pegs that were crossed with beaded strings. "I don't know how to play."

"Your colors cross." He pointed to the multi-colored strings with an excited smile, pleased that she was willing to learn. "See? Each pick two."

Az smiled over the way he fearlessly leaned up toward her, moving the strings from the pegs so that they were intricately woven, crossing each other in a lined pattern. He was perfectly comfortable with the proximity, no sudden movements, no fear of accidentally touching her hand. No worry in the way he leaned his head mere inches from hers.

She reached over his brown hand and loosened the strings back to their original places, smiling at him, "Pick your colors. I'll learn."

"Red," he nodded, "and yellow."

She just nodded happily for him to start, watching while he excitedly played his first move.

* * *

She watched her father sleep, knowing he was inches from waking by the fitful way he kept shifting. DG drew her knees up to her chest and studied the pinch that was marring his face as he curved tighter into himself on the floor. His well tailored jacket was strewn over his shoulder but only covered down to his waistline and she was considering laying the threadbare blanket he'd given her over his long and bent legs. She leaned slow off the lumpy excuse for a mattress, hand reaching for the blanket.

The slow click of an unchecked heel outside the door froze her still and hovering on the edge of the bed.

DG searched the room, swallowing hard as she tried to quiet her breathing. She looked down over her father and bit against her bottom lip. Carefully she eased up off the mattress, snagging the cane that Ahamo had negotiated from the abandoned lost and unfound that was downstairs. She lifted it and settled her grip as she stepped toward the now opening door. She swung down hard and mewled surprise as a wide palm caught it mid-blow. It was jerked up and back, twisting her arm behind her as her body was rushed back into the wall.

"Sorry I'm late, Princess" Cain's voice nuzzled smugly against her ear as he laid the front of his body tight and hard against the front of hers. "I meant to make it by dinner."

"You son of a bitch." She used her other hand to slap against his waist and he caught that as well, leaning back to look over her face while he lifted her open palm against the leather vest that caged his ribs.

"Drop the stick." He brushed the words against her cheek.

"Let go of my hands." She countered even though the angle her wrist was in was starting to throb an ache up her arm.

Wyatt grinned at her flushed reply and kissed her cheekbone, "You first."

DG just let her eyes close as he nudged her jaw up with his nose, mouth finding the same reddened spot on her throat. He licked at it lightly before laying his mouth open against it, sucking the sweet scented warmth of her in through his nose. His teeth scraped and then his tongue soothed.

"If this is you trying to win this fight," she hissed the words on a whisper against the side of his head, "It's not working."

He grinned and downed his mouth farther, aiming for the slope of her collarbone while her chest rose and her breasts lifted against his chest.

"Don't let me interrupt you." Ahamo's voice was rasping as he stood from the awkward positioning on the floor, the forgotten blanket in his hand. "I'm just going to take the bed while you're occupied."

Cain grinned wickedly at the way she groaned into embarrassment, his head lifting as he put space between them again. "Drop the stick, Princess."

"Let go of my hands."

"The two of you should go on the road." Her father commented grumpily and sat against the makeshift mattress. "You'd make a mint."

* * *

He was rubbing an apologetic and comforting warmth into her wrist while her father moved from the room in a sudden feigned search for water. A search that he had warningly promised would not take more than five minutes. Cain leaned his head down as he knelt by the bed, lips warm against the thin skin on the inside of her wrist while she used the other hand to scrape against the short trim of his light hair. After a moment she wiped her free hand down to cup his jaw and lift his head.

"I told you not to go alone." Her eyes were a sudden blue echo of her mother's. Less in coloring and size but more in control and self assuredness.

"I didn't." he smiled into the way she was rubbing the stubble that was starting to shade his jaw. "You'll see."

"Stubborn jackass." DG murmured over him and caught the way he was angling her wrist down between them while he rose up on his knees.

She followed the movement and let her fingers catch in the angled 'V' of his vest while he leaned his body up against her knees. His hand caught against her jaw and pulled her down tight, her now loosened hair tipping forward around both their faces while he kissed the corner of her mouth.

"I told you I'd find you."

The fierce way his mouth broke rough against hers was a jarring surprise. She thought he'd aimed to tease her again but his body instantly broke that illusion as he pushed up against the mattress with one hand. The other was still keeping her mouth clutched to his as his tongue drove between her lips and against her own. DG let her fingers jerk tight against his vest while the other lay against the stubbled heat of his face.

Wyatt deepened the kiss even further, letting both hands cup against her face while he stood stooping over her. She sucked against his tongue before he could pull away, letting him break the kiss only for a moment before he bent a knee against the bed and leaned her back.

Jesus Christ, he knew how to work her over.

He…there was something controlled and clear in his eyes.

He was so sure of himself as he let his other leg idle between hers.

"You're flushed." One of his hands was cradling the back of her head, fingers rubbing rhythmically against her hair while his stretched body pressed down on her. "Princess."

DG blinked up into his teasing smile. "What just happened?"

He leaned down and nipped against her bottom lip, his other hand pressing her stomach so that he was angling her farther back. "I made a choice."

"Which was?" DG stretched back while he leaned his head down against her clavicle.

"See, I was driving and thinking." Cain drew his head back when she tried to kiss him again. "And I decided…"

She watched in saddened surprise as he laid her back against the mattress but then sat to the edge, his back to the way she was laying free and open beside him. Her fingers stretched out to draw the line his holster made down his back and he leaned into the touch to stay somehow connected. His head leaning back into the way she skirted her fingers along the trim of his hairline.

"Share your epiphany, cowboy." She spoke gently to his back, "I'm losing patience."

When she pinched at his neck he angled a smile back at her. "You're still a pretty shade of pink."

DG caught the way he was looking at the drop of her throat to where the top hem of her shirt skirted her breasts. She shook her head in frustration and let her eyes close to avoid slapping him out of annoyance. She tried not to smile smugly when she felt him shift and turn to angle over her upper body. He kissed against her cheek and then leaned back beside her, nuzzling his nose into her hair while he stretched.

"Tell me." It was the demand of a princess and he damn well liked the force of it.

"Way I figure it," He laid his palm flat against her stomach. "I'm your bodyguard."

"And?" DG tipped her head to the side,

"Nobody's gonna guard an inch of that beautiful little body but me." The impish grin he gave her matched the mischief in clear blue eyes.

She didn't respond because she heard the scuffing noises her father was making outside the door. She only smiled at the same time Cain did, the both of them smirking at the ruckus the other man was making to warn them of his return. They shared a breathy bout of laughter and he rubbed his nose soft against her cheek.

"It's safe." Her voice lifted past him and toward the door. "Nothing's going on."

"Not nothing. Just enough of something." Cain whispered and stretched away from her, feeling the way her fingers fell from him as he picked up the cane she'd threatened him with and passed it to her father as he entered.

"Where are you going?" Ahamo questioned in confusion.

DG rolled her feet up onto the mattress. "He's going to go stand outside the door."

"Nah," Cain shook his head, "I'll probably sit."

She squinted at him in feigned exasperation. "Get out."

"Yes, Princess."

He was lucky she didn't have anything to throw at the door as he left.


	5. Chapter 5

A couple hours later and the heat of her and their teasing had worn off his smile and he was sitting with his head back hard against the wall. Cain drew his knees higher, boots scrabbling against the stained and soiled carpeting of the pit he'd found her in. He wiped his hat off his head, the other hand thinning the bridge of his nose with a thumb and forefinger. Eyes closed and he couldn't stop thinking about his son.

For some reason, the worry for Jeb had broken through the playful veneer he was keeping at the front line of every interaction.

He could only imagine it was seeing Ahamo's darkened glance tripping over him.

Worry. A father's worry.

"Don't shoot me, Bright Eyes." Her whisper was warm as she cracked the door open a bit.

"Heard you get out of bed." He didn't look up as she exited to the hall, just let his fingers start running circuits on the brim of his hat while he tried to ignore the newly given nickname. "You should get some more sleep. We're leaving before the second sun's up."

"Not that you'd know down here." Her fingertip started tracing his ear and he flinched slightly at the way it prickled down the back of his neck.

DG smirked down at him, "Are you ticklish, Wyatt Cain?"

He rolled his head back against the wall, arching up a brow at the slight amusement in her tone. She just smiled over him while she let her finger roll up to trace his hairline. She added another and let both of them graze the scar on his eyebrow before she made a hushing noise and wipe them down his eyes, leading him to close them. She started to move and he felt the shift. Instead of allowing it he leaned his head into the side of her leg.

DG gentled her fingers against the top of his head in surprise. Her face blanked as he rubbed his nose and cheeks against the outside of her thigh. Thoughtlessly she let her hand cup to the opposite side of his head, fingers treading the other ear in a more soothing manner.

"You're wearing the world again." She whispered over him.

"The world needs to be worn down about now." His words were uneasy and shaky against the fabric of her pants and she clutched her fingers still.

"I meant - "

"I know what you meant, Princess." When he blinked up his eyes were wetter and brighter than she'd seen them since he'd left Adora's graveside. "It needs to be done."

"How much haven't you told me?" DG asked and caught her fingers against his chin so that she could kneel down beside him, elbows leaning against her knees.

Cain just smirked at her, "Everything there is that you don't need to know."

"I'm a princess, you know?" she grinned down at him. "I have clearance."

He just nodded amiably and dropped a hand from his hat, smiling wide at the jolt of breathy surprise that racked her as he started rubbing the back of his thumb against the stretched back of her thigh, teasing it high and then back low toward her bent knee.

"Saved my life too, huh?" he winked and placed the hat back on his head.

DG watched him just tip his head back against the wall and stretch his legs flat against the hall carpeting. She was annoyed, sure… but the childlike smug smirk he was wearing was enough to spur her on. She caught his fingers and lifted them, keeping hold while she sank down beside him.

"You should be in bed." He grumbled, eyes still closed while she laid his palm flat against her thigh, head tipping onto his shoulder. Cain breathed the warm water smell of her in tight to his chest while she started stroking the back of his hand, suddenly clenching his fingers against the toned muscle of her leg.

"I can't protect you if I can't see what's past you." He finally blinked his eyes open and turned his head. "And when you do that… I can't see anything beyond it."

She matched the smug smile he'd been wearing earlier. "I know."

The chaste kiss she laid light against his lips had him leaning for more while she stretched away. "Better guard your groin when you wake me up."

"Yeah?" Wyatt smirked as he watched her stand, his eyes shamelessly roving over her backside as she stretched up.

"I kick."

He let his head back against the wall, eyes dipped closed again, "And I do look forward to that, Princess."

* * *

"You…" Glitch blinked confusion at the dog that was sitting perfectly still on the seat. "I thought you'd left."

Tutor just sniffed at him and looked forward, paws shifting minutely on the wooden planking of the Guild's wagon bench. Glitch just rolled his eyes and flicked the blanket over the belongings he'd packed in, noting the way the fires at the first gate had doubled in size. He nodded once at the comforting protection they glowed over the men that were still bustling about the tower.

"You ready?" Jeb's voice was breathless as he jogged up to the former advisor's side. "I need to talk to you before you leave."

"In a few minutes, I guess." Glitch waved at the packed wagon. "I don't think I've missed anything."

"You missed this." Jeb lifted a scrolled note and handed it to the dark haired man, half smirking. "Dad gave it to me before he left."

"Your father was busier than an underground bar nudie before he left." Glitch only feigned the grumbling annoyance to make the younger man smile. He unrolled the hastily scrolled paper and looked down over it, dipping it toward one of the fires that had sprung up outside the walls of the inner gate. He shook his head as the light flickered over the sparingly short message.

_You're not the weak link, Zip. Tribal grounds._

"I don't - "

"Meet him there instead of Finaqua." Jeb clapped him lightly against the upper arm and gave a jaunty wave to the dog that was sniffing impatiently behind him. "It's the long way around but it'll get the job done."

"Is this supposed to be some sort of compliment?" Glitch asked as Jeb started to backstep toward the gate.

"Probably 'bout as close as he gets, doncha think?" Jeb tossed up in amusement as Tutor yipped impatiently from behind them both.

The older of the two just shook his head, stuffing the note into the same pocket as the watch that he comfortingly stroked his fingers against.

"Shove over, mutt."

* * *

She didn't mind that the boy had fallen asleep in the bed that had been meant for her. It was endearing, really. He was curled like a kitten, nose bent into his balled hands. Az watched him sleep, feeling her mother's presence behind her more than hearing it. Lavender's hand rubbed against her shoulder gently and twined against her hair.

"He's a sweet child."

"I tortured him." Az whispered guilty, voice devoid of anything resembling human emotion. "I killed his family."

"You did not." Lavender's voice sternly broke over her head as her mother leaned against her back, bending to kiss her head. "Do not let that guilt live inside you."

"How can I not?" there were tears already working to blur her vision of the boy sleeping comfortably in her temporary bed. "I didn't stop her."

"She's dead." Lavender leaned the whisper over her. "You did stop her."

Az shook her head, not accepting her mother's comments as she wiped a shaking hand against the tears that were mingling with dusty soot on her cheeks. "DG stopped her."

"DG did nothing but tell you that you could." Her mother's voice went soothing and soft and it was a sound she hadn't heard in decades. "Azkadellia…she's dead."

She appreciated the support but she worried that maybe it wasn't so cut and dry.

* * *

Jeb finally sat, sighing as he nudged the boots off his pain shattered feet. He toed them both off and leaned back and he tried to run his thoughts over the intricacies of his father's plan. It was laid out with the expectation that Zero would, as expected, attack within days. And more than likely while they were on the move.

He quietly knew that his father probably wasn't wrong.

And he shook his head in wonderment at the strategic planning that he hadn't realized the other man had been manipulating all along.

"Damn it." Without thinking he started tugging the boots back on, aiming to gather a few men that he trusted. At least, mostly trusted.

* * *

"Don't you dare." He cupped his hand against her ankle as she startled awake.

DG frowned and shied her face down into the makeshift pillow she'd made from her leather jacket, groaning into it. She heard him laugh half-heartedly as his hand shaded up over the blanket to prod at her hipbone. A groan rumbled off her lips and she curled into the way he was crouched beside the bed and opened her eyes. He had his hat drawn down tight over his head, jacket slung on his shoulders again and his other hand was fingering the line of his holster strap as he leaned into the poor excuse for a mattress.

"Wake up." He whispered and jutted his chin against his forearm. "I need you to move for me, DG."

"No." she groused at him and angled her hip so that he was rubbing heat against her hip with the full flat of his palm. The wide strength of his hand flushed heat from her stomach and on out through her limbs.

"I'm just going to stay here and sleep." She blinked wearily at him in the darkness of the room, noting that his eyes were still bright enough to slay her. "Save the world without me this time."

"I can't." Cain shook his head minutely and leaned closer, laying his lips against her arm tentatively. He kissed light and soft before smirking at her again.

"Where's my father?"

"He left half an hour ago to find some food." The hand that had been on her hip raised so that he was hovering it over her face. "He's meeting us topside."

"You have more plans going than an overworked architect."

His look of confusion afforded her a pleased smile. She liked confusing him sometimes. It entertained her and it also let more light into the blue of his eyes as he stared back with bewildered affection. DG rolled onto her back, catching the fingers that he started to lift away with her sudden movement. She stalled their connected hands above her body and stared at them. Thankfully she didn't have to stare down a wedding ring as she studied the palm of his left hand.

"Wyatt?" she turned her head to watch his eyes flick brighter at the use of his first name.

He just made a questioning noise in his throat as she brought his hand down against her stomach, flattening his fingers against it.

"Do you ever regret that you didn't just keep walking?" she just kept her eyes down on his fingers as he started rubbing a counter heat to the warmth breaking open in her stomach.

The fear that he could see riding in the wide blue of her eyes was something that made him distinctly uncomfortable. He had two instantaneous reactions – one to break from her and save her from wearing that glance again, the second to curl her up tight and lay at her back while he sucked in the smell of her hair.

He did neither.

Instead he stretched up over her body, bending at the waist so that he could lean his upper body over hers. His eyes roved briefly over the way her dark hair spread over her jacket and lay taunting on one shoulder. Cain watched her blink nervously, her lips parted while she worriedly waited for his response. He laid his hand to her stomach again while the other pressed the bed beside her head.

DG sucked down a nervous breath while he dragged a hard rubbing palm up over her breasts. Cain smiled as he broke a groaning kiss into her mouth, cupping his palm and letting his thumb rasp a quickly hardening nipple through the fabric of her shirt. He swallowed the pleased sound she whimpered into his mouth, drinking it down as her breathing stalled. He flexed his palm tighter and danced his tongue to hers.

She sighed into the way he broke the kiss by sucking her bottom lip, "We need to go, Princess."

DG just grumped an annoyed noise and he swept his hand back down away as he started to move.

"And that," he stretched off her and whipped the blanket from her prone form as she gave up fighting his movement, "is the only current regret I have when it comes to you."

"Current?"

"Mmm." He nodded and picked her boots up off the floor, dangling them at her.

"See if I ever make you Consort." She kicked the blanket farther down and sat up, surprised by the way he moved rapidly in at the words.

Cain tugged her face up, his eyes full and wide again. "You… you didn't just say that."

"It was a joke." She took the boots from his hand while he held her chin gentle in his calloused cupped palm. "I was just - "

"I wouldn't…I don't expect something like that, DG." Cain shook his head, his voice crackling. "It's not… I'm not…"

"I didn't think you were hunting for a royal title, Tin Man." She spoke slowly and evenly as she stilled her entire body. "We have bigger things to worry about."

He traced his thumb down her cheek with a saddened glance. "I would advise you to never ask me."

"Why?" Worried confusion wracked a fierce cold through all her limbs.

"I wouldn't be able to say no." he stepped away toward the door, "And then you'd be stuck with me."


	6. Chapter 6

She wasn't in the mood for chatting and, thankfully, her father had realized that and let his horse lag a pace behind. DG shook her head, thinking about the way Cain had wordlessly untied all three horses from a copse of trees a mile or so from the entrance – still completely astounded that he'd been able to find all three of them.

"You're not funny, you know?" she tossed her voice up ahead and watched the way he pranced the white mare into a slowing circle before rearing her to a stop.

"I wasn't alone." He shrugged, face still as passive as it had been when he wordlessly loaded her up onto the Pinto.

"You're not funny." DG shook her head again and prodded her horse faster.

"Hey," Wyatt leaned forward and dug his heels back slightly, speeding up to catch the way she was forcing the smaller horse into a harder gallop. "You never said - "

"You knew what I meant." Her darkening glance tossed back with the same whipping fury of wind tossed dark hair and he let the mare slow again as he watched her keep moving forward.

Wyatt let the horse idle into its own comfortable speed, feeling safe that she was only far enough away to cut off discussion - he could still see her pert body tight over the central balance line of the horse. He watched quietly, shaking his head at her reaction. She had smirked at first when she'd seen the horses, eyes roving over him. It had been when her eyes had settled on his face and met his eyes that emotion had hardened her normally wide and light glance.

"You didn't listen to her." Ahamo's voice cast up his back and at first Wyatt ignored it.

He finally turned his head as the other man cantered his own horse beside. "She's taking it a little hard, isn't she?"

Ahamo just snorted a laugh and looked forward to his daughter and the way she was tight laid against the Pinto's rolling shoulders. "She wants to guard you as much as you guard her, Mr Cain. Unfortunately, she has the Zone to answer to… she can't just run off on a horse and play with a gun."

Wyatt hardened his glance at the Royal Consort but said nothing, thinking better of arguing the point the other man was trying to make. He looked forward again, studied the whipped flow of her hair behind her, head cocking slightly as she slowed her horse's gait and slowly turned the bi-color creature. He gave her a confused glance, watching as she let the pony prance, until they caught up slightly.

"Watch her run." Ahamo said just loud enough for the other man to hear. "But she knows when to hold at the line. She's learning."

"She'll run again." Cain had already started speeding up his mare. "She'll always be headstrong, Consort. I won't let that die in her."

Ahamo watched the other man try to catch her before DG dug the pony into another breaking gallop. He laughed to himself and shook his head, watching the way the suns were rising pink and sagging full.

"Red in the morning…"

* * *

It was difficult, as she watched her oldest daughter sleep in the double sun rising, to stay still and keep from wiping a hand into long dark hair. She remembered all too easily the comfort that could be found in twisting the locks of either of her daughters. The both of them were bright, too bright in the Zone. She knew that at some point, some of their inherent light would be shuttered up by politics and battling the social hierarchy. Azkadellia would lose some the kind innocence she had finally regained and Dorothy… the free spirit that made her so likable and charming was going to be publicly hanged to choking once she ruled.

She would rule, Lavender mused.

Because Azkadellia would fight to lose her own birthright.

She knew it already… she knew that the older of the two wouldn't want to be the ruling hand again, no matter the current circumstances.

It wasn't easy being a mother of two ingenious children that had an extraordinary skill for getting into trouble…especially in combination with ruling a land that didn't always want to be peacefully ruled. She wasn't sure she was doing the right thing by placing as much trust as she had in the former Tin Man that was running their escape. Each turn of his intricate plan had surprised her, but only in that he must have been planning such a strategy since before the witch was even dead.

Which allowed that he trusted more in her daughters than she had.

Guilt was the bile that was scraping her throat raw.

Lavender wiped a hand against her face and leaned back on the spare cot that had been kindly afforded her, her back laying against the mud brick walling while she watched Azkadellia's face pinch in unhappy non-rest. The oldest of her children had the same feeling of wrought dread that she did, she was sure. It was stagnant between them… and it was making the both of them rightfully uncomfortable.

She knew, as much as Wyatt Cain must have known, that Azkadellia would be the first and fastest target.

And more than likely…within the day.

* * *

"Get off the horse."

DG ignored the way he leveled a commanding tone at her and lifted her chin, eyes meeting his as she continued to circled the youngest of the horses around him. He arched an eyebrow and lifted the hat off his head, wiping the sweat from his forehead with the back of the other hand as he loosed the mare to find something to eat. He watched the horse head for the creek he'd stalled them at, sweat sheening off her brightly.

"Princess," he finally sighed a tired glance at her, "He needs to rest and drink. Let him loose."

She pursed her lips at his logic and finally stilled the Pinto, ignoring the hand he offered her and leaned off the saddle herself so that her feet padded easily to the ground. DG put both hands to her hair and wiped it back, facing him easily as he patted at the horse, allowing it to follow his own. When he looked back his glance settled on the reddened mark that still lay along the side of her neck.

"Are we speaking yet?" he set the hat back on his head, squinting at her in the flaring of both suns.

"When did we stop speaking?" she asked in a supposedly innocent tone, eyes softening as she noted the lines that were tiring his face.

Cain let his brow lower farther as he gave her a token glare, his hand reaching out to latch her wrist. "Let's walk."

"I'm hungry." DG said pleadingly as he pulled her toward the water, his head tipping comfortably to where Ahamo was already slinging off his jacket in the heat of the day.

He just nodded and kept walking her toward the water. "Me too, Princess."

* * *

"You and I are about to straighten this out." Both her wrists were suddenly flexed into one of his palms and DG glanced quickly up at him as he flushed her up toward a tree.

"We have nothing to straighten out, Mr Cain." She taunted him quietly with the formality, jaw jutting up in a purely stubborn fashion.

The flush of ice color in his eyes was burning hot on her as he pressed both her hands into her stomach and walked her hard back into a tree. She didn't argue with the way a broken limb was jabbing awkwardly into her left kidney as he dragged his hips directly into hers and used the other hand to pull her head to the side, fingers lacing and locking in her hair.

"I will always," he licked at the reddened mark on her throat, "always be the willing target between you and someone who is trying to hurt you."

"Cain - "

"That's where I want to be." He kissed the words slow against her skin.

"Then I don't want you to - "

His head jerked up furiously and his eyes seemed even bluer than before, "I don't care what you want, Princess. It's done. Promise made."

DG felt anger fester up in her and she tried to move both her hands to push him away but he just watched her, fingers tightening on her wrists in a manner that promised she wouldn't win a physical altercation. She stopped fighting him and met his eyes, holding them while they both tried to level their breathing. It took a moment before she realized that he was stroking through her hair in the softest way imaginable. His grip had loosened at some point and his other thumb was cresting the back of her left hand.

"Let go of me." She whispered.

"Not until you hear what I'm saying." He shook his head minutely, just enough to make his point. "It's where I want to be, DG."

She nodded slowly, "Let go."

He loosed her fingers but kept the other hand in her hair. DG let her hands rise slowly to his vest, skimming her nails against the leather. He watched in silent interest as she stroked one hand down to skirt the bottom hem of it, the other lifting so that her palm could curl at the break of his neck and shoulder. He could help the urge to lean into her.

"Don't kiss me." She shook her head and paused his movement. "Not yet."

Wyatt heard himself groan before realizing he'd done it, eyes slamming closed as her hand drove down and rubbed between his thighs, cupping heat there. Her fingers stroked slow and steady at the hardness she'd started and he swallowed with an audible noise. He was well enough surprised that she leaned in to kiss the stubble that was shading his jaw darker.

"Promise me something." Her voice was weak against his ear. "Promise you'll guard yourself too."

Both his hands dug her arms as he growled his mouth into the crook of her neck, scraping his teeth on the same mark before sucking against it. He kissed his way up to behind her ear as she tightened the way her hand was rubbing against the sweat damp fabric of his pants. His lower body pressed back hard into her hand as he dropped his fingers to stretch up under her shirt. DG's breathing stuttered a moment as he stroked up against the overheated fabric of her bra. His palm cupped around one breast with such perfect aim that she flexed her body even closer when he pinched against her nipple.

"Promise me, Tin Man." Her face had laid against his jaw and he could smell violets, sweat, and still the lingering twist of almost-rain in her hair.

"I promise." His mouth broached hers carefully, tongue tasting her bottom lip while she kept stroking slow and teasing fingers against him.

She let him wreck her harder against the tree, his groan pouring into her mouth while she pressed her hand tighter and harder against him. The flared heat of him in her palm made her instantly wet and she knew that she'd already lost the fight. When he strangled a moan into her mouth she didn't care who won anymore.

He broke the kiss abruptly, pressing his forehead raggedly to hers while his hand reached down to hold her smaller one cupped between his legs. "Now promise me something?"

DG smirked at the fact his eyes were still closed and his body was still humming against hers, "Hmmm?"

"Next time you put your hand there it's not because you're trying to win a ridiculous argument by way of wiles."

DG laughed at the way he cocked one eye open at her teasingly. "I can't believe you just accused me of having 'wiles'."

"You're the one with your hand - "

"Next time," she flexed her fingers on him, forcing his body to double into her, "it won't be just my hand."

"That's my Princess." He kissed her chastely and removed her hand, tugging her along as he stepped away. "I'm hungry."

DG rolled her eyes as he tugged her along, "So was I."

* * *

"Azkadellia." Lavender sucked down her daughter's name when fear cracked over her with a cold sweat.

"I… I know." Az nodded, speaking quietly. "I can feel it."

"They're close."

"We should leave." The younger woman murmured quietly so as not to startle the older female Viewer that was cooking something delicious smelling over a nearby fire. "We can't bring it down on them."

"They already know it's coming." Lavender said just as gently, eyes training over other people that were surrounding them.

Az followed her mother's glance, searching around them for the clue to whatever secret her mother was contemplating. She looked around them, catching sight of the way Kalm was quietly helping another female barely ten feet away. Her mouth parted slightly as she searched around the cabin they'd been given to stay in, the double suns hot pressing over them lazily.

"The males are gone." She whispered in awed realization.

"They aren't gone." Lavender answered and reached cautiously for her daughter's hand, fingers catching tight. "They're guarding."

"The emerald is close." Az added quietly. "At least, closer."

Lavender just nodded agreement.

* * *

He leaned his forehead into his hand, groaning weariness as he tried to scrape his fingers against his hairline to rouse himself. Jeb looked over the countless reports that he'd spread over the table in front of them, trying to focus on the hand scrawled letters that swam and mingled before him. He finally stood in frustration and headed for the tankard of water that he'd intentionally left across the room.

He knew it was too early to have heard anything from the men he'd sent out to the tribal lands, or the scouts he'd had scattered in various directions. It didn't leave him off of worrying about it though. He cast a glance back to the table as he gulped down half a glass of cool water, contemplating how many Longcoats they'd already killed or detained in the cells that were in the tower.

Zero hadn't been one of them.

He'd searched every dead body to be sure.

Attended to every prisoner.

And the bastard was still out there.

* * *

"Glad you're here." Raw's face was full of emotion and Glitch couldn't help but lean a smile back as he dropped his weight off the side of the wagon.

"Me too." He stretched his back, watching as Tutor hopped off the other side and went in a deft run toward the encampment. "That wagon's no royal coach."

Raw just offered another smile and waved toward where another group of Viewers were waiting off beside the wagon. There was a considerable number of Guild members milling about with them and the very physical difference of the two groups had Glitch grinning as he took the canteen of water his friend offered.

"Cain and DG?"

Raw's face fell into a shadowed sadness, "Not yet."

"They'll be here." Glitch nodded rapidly, trying to force support into his tone. "Cain's not going to let anything happen without getting his gun hand into it."

"Hope not." Raw motioned the other man toward a sloping hill after Glitch genially handed the water canteen to one of the Guild-lings. "Queen and Azkadellia very nervous."

Glitch nodded, "I'll talk to them."

* * *

He nicked his jaw hard with the razor when he heard a pained crying sound come from the bottom of her lungs. "Damn it."

DG's whimper was the only thing he heard as he swung away from the creek bed, head lifted sharply as the razor handle clenched in one hand and he drew his pistol with the other. Her face was stricken pale, nearly white in the shade of the tree branches. Her hands hand both laid flat against the side of her horse as she leaned forward.

"DG?" Ahamo was already closer and his hands both touched against one of her arms, trying to level her as she bent. "Dorothy?"

She pulled hard away from the way her father tried to comfort her and Cain stepped into the way she started to double over. He handed the weapon around her to her father after searching the trees that surrounded them. Ahamo took it silently, holding it with more practiced ease than he had expected. Wyatt closed the razor with one hand while the other soothed against her shoulder blades. He pocketed it quickly while sharing a concerned glance with her father.

"Tell me what you're seeing." He murmured over the way she was bending double toward the grass.

"Nothing." She spit the word out to the ground. "I can't see her."

"Her?" Ahamo questioned and stepped to the side of them.

Cain crouched in front of her, wiping at the blood that was starting to warm on his chin. He put both hands to the backs of her legs and looked up at the way she shivered pale and uncomfortable. He crooned a soothing noise and watched her eyes shut as she started to sway slightly. Her hand had broken against his shoulder for balance and he just stayed crouched below her bent form, waiting as she moaned another hurt noise.

"Come on." His hands pulled at the backs of her knees, forcing her to kneel gracelessly into the damp packed ground while he lifted his fingers to her arms. "Tell me."

"It's Az." DG's swallowed against the frothy burn of bile in her throat. "She's… I don't know. She's calling me."

"You're connected." He spoke gently.

"They've always been connected. Since Dorothy was born." Ahamo spoke over them, eyes still searching the trees that surrounded them. "Is she still okay?"

"She's scared." DG leaned forward so that Cain was holding her up with strong hands braced on her upper arms. "She's… Wyatt? There's something wrong."

"Okay."

"I mean here." She snapped a glance to the trees. "Not just there."

He nodded and brushed his hand against her jaw but stopped short when the stain of red on his fingers broke against the pale of her flawless skin. "Can you ride?"

She just nodded quickly, letting him haul her up against his chest while he stood.

"Then ride." He whispered and she helped her mount the horse. "And don't look behind you."

"Wyatt." She jerked the reigns in one hand, the other catching his jaw and wiping the blood that was still trickling.

"Don't look behind you, DG." He demanded again, one hand out for his pistol while the other stroked the tensed muscle of her calf. "Go."

"You promised me." She led the horse to draw back from the water as he cocked the hammer on the gun.

"I know." He caught her eyes as she started to turn the horse in the opposite direction. "I said go."

She didn't blink as she dug her heels hard, startling the animal into a hard jutting gallop. He watched her go before glancing to her father, surprised when the other man drew his own weapon from his retrieved coat. Wyatt jerked his hat and jacket up from the ground and swung them on as easily as he could with a gun in one hand. When he looked up her father was still watching her ride away.

"Well done, Consort." Ahamo's voice was sardonic as he spared him a grimace. "Was that smart?"

Cain whistled loud for the mare, cocking a hard glance at the older man while his voice stung out, "I'm right behind her, Consort."


	7. Chapter 7

He'd barely counted to fifty, back tight over the line of the horse's spine, when he heard the first shot sound and echo past him. The horse side stepped and he corrected, keeping himself in line behind DG. He called to her, urging her to keep going while he heard another whip cracking shot. He wasn't sure where Ahamo was. He didn't look back to find out while he twisted the reigns into his bunched left fist. Wyatt straightened his back, making himself more a target to keep from a bullet passing toward her and instantly knew –

Mistake.

"Son of a bitch!" His teeth knocked together as he coughed pain up against them, tongue nipped to bleeding a moment before the sound cracked in his ear. But the sound always came after… he'd nearly been unhorsed and he'd unintentionally reared her to a rough and side tumbling stop from the way he'd slung from the weight of a bullet passing his arm. Bastards. It was the same damn shoulder.

He gritted his teeth together, trying to control the way the mare was stumbling. He loosened his hold on the reigns and flung himself off the opposite side with much less grace than he'd intended, letting her track off to the left. When he lifted his head he could see Ahamo jerk his own mount off to the opposite side. A truck, similar to the one he had taken but looking much worse for wear, was bearing down on him.

And the bastard that had shot him was leaning cockily out a cracked window.

"Follow her." Cain slapped hard at the backside of the other man's horse, barely catching the sympathetic way the Consort matched his eyes as the horse jaunted back into a hard gallop.

"The same fucking shoulder." He cocked the pistol up, not even looking at the wound he felt trickling hot while he took a shot at the truck, the curse he'd gleaned from DG already feeling comfortable on his tongue.

Cain spit phlegmy blood into the packed ground as the truck wheeled sidelong to a jerking stop. He'd been wrong. And that fact alone had him furious. It hadn't been Azkadellia… Either Zero was manic enough to alter the rules of basic logical strategy or this was a rogue hit that was merely coincidence. Either way… It was done here.

"Stand." One of the Longcoats screeched from inside the truck. "Hold, Cain."

"You shot me first." He yelled back angrily, taking another potshot at the front end of the truck.

"Hold." One of the men stepped from the truck, his own weapon aimed at Cain's head.

Wyatt stepped forward with the same sweated glance of hatred the other man wore. He was forcing his arm to stay up, pain just now rounding up and radiating from the way the bullet had winged his right arm. The suns bearing down on him forced him to squint and he realized he'd lost his hat in the tumbling tip off the horse. The Long coat was young and looked scrappier than Wyatt had expected. The other stayed lodged between the truck and the open driver's door, head ducked low.

"I was told to give you a chance." The younger man's jaw lifted marginally. "One chance. Make a choice, Tin Man."

Wyatt considered the barely born kid in front of him and shook his head, slowly letting the gun hand drop. Blood was already sealing his shirt to his skin like mud had packed on his son's knees when he played after a thunderstorm. He dropped the gun to the dirt and took another step forward, catching the sudden wracked confusion in the other man's eyes. The Longcoat lifted his own weapon higher, choosing the kill spot somewhere on the former Tin Man's forehead.

"You got a girl?" Wyatt rolled his fingers, looking down minutely to see blood starting to stain the cuff of his shirt.

"What?" the kid shook his head slightly. "Hands up."

"I asked," Cain murmured as he lifted his hands. "if you've got a girl."

"Get on your knees."

He complied, putting his hands up even higher, wincing at the thundered volley of pain up his arm as he flexed the muscle of his bicep. His fingers pressed the back of his head tentatively as he breathed slowly through the way his stomach was churning.

Something had to give.

Had to break.

Something, for once, had to work.

"I have one." Wyatt whispered quietly, looking toward the truck, watching the figure that he'd noticed moving behind it moments before. "She's - "

"I know all about it." The Longcoat let the muzzle of the gun press behind his ear as his other hand caught one of Wyatt's wrists.

"I meant to say…" he turned his palm just enough to catch and nudge the tip of the weapon away while he shunted his head back into the other man's groin.

He flipped the younger man hard into the dirt, using the still pain screaming arm to wedge the gun to the ground while the other landed a solid hit into the soft skin of the Longcoat's larynx. His sticky blood-wet hand braced the pistol while he scrambled a knee into the other man's already tortured groin and hit him again, this time in the face.

"I meant to say," his teeth grated before he spit into the bloodied face below him. "that she's one of the two things I'd kill for."

"You done?" Jonah Hays, panting as he stepped away from the bloodied body that now lay beside the truck, was red in the face and bending double.

"Not yet." Cain grunted and landed another hit into the younger man's face, knocking him unconscious with the brute force of the hit.

He looked up to say something smart back to the man he hadn't been sure he should trust… but that's about when he tip-landed on his back, blinking unconscious into two red roving suns.

* * *

"Do not - " Ahamo stopped his words when she flashed him a glare, her horse high stepping nervously as she tried to keep in one place.

"Thirty seconds." She was counting already and he was sure she was mentally counting at double speed, watching the empty hill they'd just come down with wide eyes.

"Don't go back there Dorothy." He tried to gentle his tone to calm the wash of fear and anger that was changing the usually pretty color of her eyes.

DG flicked him a glossy glare, "Don't call me Dorothy."

"You're upset."

"I'm going." She reared the horse back up the hill and he sighed as he aimed to follow her.

* * *

Azkadellia only stared blankly at the pocket watch that Glitch was offering her. She didn't need to open it; she already knew what was in it. There was a verdant wave of energy coming off the metal that she wasn't sure anyone else could see. It pulled at her slightly and the fact that she stepped forward toward it shattered the thin illusion that she had control over anything at the moment.

"No." she lifted both hands and shook her head, eyes squinting against the tensing feeling of dread that was weighing heavier with every moment.

"Ambrose," the Queen murmured and put out her hand as she stepped in behind him. "Give it to me."

Glitch frowned at her in sad confusion, turning slowly.

Lavender offered a supportive smile and spread her palm flatter, "I'm sorry. I'll take it, Glitch."

He slowly laid the watch into her palm, casting a cautious glance between the two women. His eyes were wide, as though he were waiting for a disaster to come from the very act of handing it to the Queen instead of the last woman who had held it. He breathed out a level sigh of relief as nothing happened. Lavender just clipped it to the bodice of her dress and tucked it away to a place he didn't dare look.

"How are you ladies feeling?" he asked and glanced around the inside of the hut that Az had taken refuge in.

She just shrugged in response, leaning her body to sit on one of the cots, "Very strange."

"How?" the Queen questioned gently, concern showing in her usually steely eyes.

"DG's scared." She murmured and glanced to her hands, flexing one of them. "Nervous."

"Did something happen?" the fear that flooded her mother's voice was actually a comfort compared to the usual tone she used when in command.

"I'm not sure what." Azkadellia whispered up, sharing her mother's concern. "She's not hurt. But…"

"She's in flux."

"I suppose." Az nodded. "That's how you could describe it."

Lavender just nodded, "Can you tell how close she is?"

"Close." Az nodded quickly. "It's getting stronger."

"Your father?"

She just shrugged in sad apology, "I don't know."

The older woman frowned and looked toward the door, "I don't either. That's what concerns me."

* * *

"But you're so pretty when you first wake up." Jonah kept pressure on the wound and Wyatt just groaned half annoyance at him. "I could kiss you right now."

"Still bleeding?" he asked the older man and used the other arm to prop himself up from the ground. He 'accidentally' let his foot kick the Longcoat's head as he scrambled for purchase against the dirt.

"Oh, it's a pretty one." Jonah nodded with a frown. "Needs to be stitched up some."

"Just brace it." Wyatt growled and cast a glance around them. "There should be more of 'em."

"Numbers are low. They can't spare large groups." The other man answered. "Figured you might still be around here."

"You should be damn near Finaqua." Wyatt hissed as the other man tried to help him pull the jacket from the still tacky wound.

"You're welcome." Jonah laid his thumb into the soft skin around the wound to make a point and Cain hissed. "You owe me an apology. Two actually."

Wyatt nodded, "That I do."

"I'll wait until after the youngest Princess filets you, uhkay?" Jonah jerked his head behind his friend and Wyatt just groaned, knowing she'd done something stupid by coming back.

"You're a hero, Hays."

"I am today."

* * *

He finally breathed easy, slacking the ropes that he'd tied to the saddle hook of his own horse. Ahamo cast a glance behind him to be sure the mare and the Pinto were still keeping a comfortable pace with his own horse. Once satisfied with their easy movements he looked forward to the truck that was slowly gaining ground on him. He wagered maybe an hour before he lost sight of it into the sunset.

His head tipped back slightly as he watched the truck, relaxing his tensed up body as much as possible. He let his shoulders sag slightly as he rolled with the gait of the horse, considering the way his daughter was faring…

She reminded him so much of Lavender, the beautifully stubborn and eagerly generous way she had been when they'd met.

He let his eyes lower as he checked the wrapped reigns again, sadness at the thought of his wife pinching his brow. He'd been happy to have her back and losing her again after just one night had been a stunning blow to his morale. It wasn't that he didn't have faith that he'd find her again… It was the sheer disappointment of hours compared to the years that he'd imagined.

There was a certain jealousy brooding in him that Cain had found a way to stay close to Dorothy while splitting him from his wife.

Ahamo shook his head up from his own self pity and swallowed, breathing in the warm air through his nose while the truck tipped over a hilltop. He could still see the top of it jaunting about but that was it. It did nothing but make him a measure more nervous than he already was.

He'd been alone for a fair number of years now.

A few more hours wasn't going to kill him.

Hopefully.

* * *

"Stop flinching." Her eyes were squinting dark blue while she tried to stitch the slice that cut an angry red angle across his upper arm.

"It wasn't me, sweetheart." He let his head fall loose against the back of the passenger seat, legs stretched out across the enclosed back of the vehicle. "Truck's screwing you up."

"Mmmm." DG nodded and elbowed the seat that Jonah was in. "Wanna slow it down?"

"I was told to step on it." He replied easily and cast a quick glance back to the way Cain nodded at him before gunning the engine harder.

DG glared between the two men and leaned back in, once again trying to angle the stitching along his arm as she shook her head. "This is going to get infected."

"We're driving straight into a pack of healers, Princess." He flexed his jaw and drove his head back into the seat he was leaned up against, "I'm not worried about an infection."

"I could have driven." She murmured as she finished closing up the wound with some makeshift supplies she'd found in the truck. "Ahamo shouldn't be alone."

"He's not alone." He cracked open one eye as he grinned at her and grunted when her fist punched his thigh lightly.

"Stop beating on me." He caught her fingers and pulled her closer. "Please."

"Temporarily." She acquiesced and leaned into his chest, letting her head drop against his collarbone while he wiped at her hair.

"I'm fine, baby." He settled the words into a wave of sweat damp dark hair. "Breathe a little."

"I'm breathing."

Actually, she was crying… finally.

It broke open on him like the fault crack of a dam exploding on the boy that had held his hand against it in desperate exhaustion.

He didn't say anything, knowing from the way she curled into him and the choked back way she was trying not to make a sound that she was trying to hide it. He curled both arms against her and tightened her down into his chest while wiping his jaw slowly back and forth against the top of her head.

"C'mere." He whispered, pulling her tighter, forcing her to straddle against his waist and settle into him while he laid her head against the uninjured shoulder. "Let this one go. Been a long time coming."

DG laughed in scoffing embarrassment and cupped her hand between her tear damp face and his throat. Wyatt just shushed his lips against the side of her face, kissing up the salt of her tears while his good hand rubbed her back softly. His other hand curled against the way she had her calf turned from his side. He bent his head to kiss her full on the forehead, waiting as she wiped at her face again. His other hand came up to press her now wet hair off her face as he gave her a calm and softened glance.

"Your father's going to be fine." He nodded, "I'm fine. Your mother and your sister will be fine."

"Don't coddle me." She grumbled at him.

"Too late." He winked at her and tugged her tighter against his lap. "Can't stop now. It's habit."

DG just gave him an annoyed glance and wiped the last of her tears off her face, "You annoy me."

"That must be hard for you." he kissed her softly, whispering into the corner of her warm lips "Especially considering you wanna lay me out naked somewhere and do incredibly wicked things to me with that perfectly made mouth."

"I never said that." She smirked into the way the comment had lightened her eyes as she drew back.

Cain just smugly grinned at her, "Didn't deny it either though did you, Princess?"

He jerked her still when she pressed her body down hard into his groin.

"What's wrong, Mr Cain?" she watched him in taunting scrutiny.

"You'll be the end of me." Wyatt just grinned, "I shoulda let him shoot me."

DG lifted her hand and let one finger trail down the thin bridge of his nose while he let his eyes dip closed. "Well, it would have saved me the trouble."

* * *

"You're dreaming." He brushed the kissed words against her forehead.

Well, if he were to be honest, she was jamming his injured arm into the seat that they were both leaning against. And it hurt like a bitch.

He let that complaint go in silence as she lifted her hand against her face and rubbed hard before nuzzling her face into his neck. DG groaned against the warm flush of his sweaty skin and tested a kiss against his throat. The rumbled noise that came from his throat denoted approval and she continued, debating leaving the same break of red against his skin that he'd left on her. She didn't get the chance when his hand caught her jaw and drew her mouth against his. His tongue roughly forced her lips to part and DG gasped in the warmth of his mouth while he tipped his head.

"Still alive back there?" Jonah's voice was more annoying than he remembered it being but he drew his mouth from hers, letting it wipe against her cheek.

"Yeah," Cain grunted. "Problems?"

"Naw." The other man murmured as he tapped the brake pedal of the truck. "Might wanna see this though."

* * *

"Jesus." DG squinted and looked away from the body that was hanging slick and bloody from a tree, "That's disgusting."

Wyatt stepped away from her and leaned down, picking up a stick with his good arm so that he could prod the swinging body around with it. The man's face and skin were completely mangled and ripped bloody from the remaining muscle. Bugs swarmed the body and he angled his head away as much as possible from the dank stench, eyes studying the leftover black leather that still hung from the skinned limbs.

"The Eastern Guild flayed him and strung him up as a warning." Cain said gently.

Jonah let off a low whistle, "I think the munchkins mean business."

"So?" DG made sure to look at him so that she didn't end up staring at the way gnats and flies were clinging to the former Longcoat.

"So," Cain turned back toward the truck and flung the stick away from them. "We're close. Let's go."


	8. Chapter 8

"You're not a very enthusiastic conversationalist, you know?" Glitch rolled a now completely bored glance to his recent companion.

Raw just quirked him a slightly confused glance and shifted higher on the log that they had been sharing. Another Viewer was only a few steps away and the guild members that had been assigned to their pack were feeding a fire that had finally started to blaze warm.

"Raw has plenty to say." He shrugged and handed some freshly made grain bread to the other man. "Glitch doesn't want to hear."

"I can listen." He defended himself hotly and stuffed a chunk of bread in his mouth. "Speak."

"Not listen," the Viewer corrected while offering the rest of the bread to the other Viewer genially. "Hear."

"I'm hearing." Glitch mumbled around the bread.

"Azkadellia knows something is coming." The fairer of the two lowered his tone so that the others didn't hear much more than a hum of conversation. "And the Queen. And the tribe."

"Sure." Glitch pieced off another piece of bread. "I got that much."

"Not just Zero." Raw was staring hard into the fire. "Zero will come. He will not win."

"The witch?"

"No." the Viewer shook his head. "Witch is dead. Different evil."

Glitch blinked his own glaze toward the fire, suddenly very quiet while he tried to swallow more than he should have chewed off. "Wonderful."

"There must be balance. Good, evil. One evil dies, another takes the empty place. Like the witch but not. Bigger than Zero, but far off." Raw sighed out the words. "Like when the sky breaks."

"You know a thunderstorm is coming before it hits." Glitch murmured. "But how far off? How long before - "

He was suddenly hushed by the cuffing of a Guild-ling's hand on his arm. Dark eyes lifted and he tried to see past the bright flare of the fire, realizing that he'd cursed his night vision by staring too long at the light. Glitch stood slowly, the food forgotten on the log as he took a step to the side, feeling the munchkin move away from him quickly.

"What do they see?"

"They hear." Raw's entire body lifted from the stump. "But they don't realize."

"Realize what?" he couldn't help the nervous high pitched tip to his tone.

"DG." The other man whispered, his eyes going brighter in the light from the fire. "And Cain."

"They're alive?"

"They're here."

* * *

He didn't even try to stop her, just lagged behind while she flooded excitement and broke into a nearly klutzy run in the half darkness. He let his steps slow so that he could rub shoulder to shoulder with the older Tin Man, eyeing the way she jumped a hug at the happily dumbfounded former advisor. Cain eyed the Guild fighters that were flanking him, their weapons still drawn while her voice carried in exuberant excitement. There was a young innocence to her happy tone that made him smile as the other man chuckled beside him.

"Take you off the spit, my friend." Jonah murmured quietly, "Excuse, me… Captain."

"What?" Wyatt jerked his head sidelong in confusion.

"The way you watch her," Hays laughed giddily again, "You're cooked. Baked, fried, battered. Done and done in, Captain Cain."

He squinted annoyance at the other man, avoiding his statement. "Captain?"

"I do believe you were declared the Captain of the Royal Guard before you left Central City." The older of the two continued to vocally jab at his friend. "Were you not?"

"I do believe I could add another hole to your damn fat head." Wyatt grunted and let his good hand skim the strap of his holster, eyes searching back for her as they neared the fire. "Could I not?"

"Maybe could, maybe could not."

He decided to let his old friend continue the conversation in a more one-sided manner, quickening his steps. His jaw twitched in both pride and near enough to a twinge of jealousy as Glitch passed a hand in her hair. He shook it off, realizing that the relief he felt to see the other two men alive was considerably more rewarding than a misplaced pang of envy.

He quickened his steps even more, smirking at the way the munchkins stumbled into loping to keep up with his longer gait. She was already passing her hands warm and comforting against the furred tunic that their Viewer friend was wearing. Raw leaned his head in against hers as she wrapped tight arms against his shoulders.

"Cain." Glitch's face flushed with happy recognition, a hug swinging against the lighter haired man that was only awkward for a moment.

"Tell me you still have it?" Wyatt kept a hand fisted in the other man's jacket.

"I don't." Glitch shook his head, eyes dropping with the same speed as his voice.

"Have what?" DG's voice leaked between them but he ignored it, fisting his fingers tighter and tugging the other man close again.

"Zip?"

"I gave it to the Queen." Glitch grinned back up, blinking in supposed innocence.

"Gave her what?"

"You simple addled genius." Cain hugged the man back into his chest, knocking the wind from the brunette. "Thank you."

"Gave her what?" DG stepped tight into the two of them, eyes scrutinizing the excited relief they were sharing.

"The emerald, Princess." Wyatt just tapped her nose lightly. "Glitch was the mule."

"I prefer 'royal guardian'." Glitch corrected and let up a bubbling laugh. "Wait til you see it, Deeg."

"Shhh." Cain touched his finger to his lips to hush the dangerous discussion and stepped away from the both of them, cupping his good hand against Raw's arm. "We owe your people a pretty big thank you."

"Not done yet." Raw blinked at him but nodded graciously. "Night's walk back to tribal camp at least. Wagon's faster."

Wyatt just nodded and wiped a hand up to pull the hat from his head. "We'll go in a few hours."

"Sit." Raw spoke gently, head tipping toward the fire while his eyes studied the lagged way that Cain was holding his shoulder. "Let Raw look."

"It's fine."

"Let him look." DG's hand skated against his back as she tucked the front of her body against the straight fall of his good arm. "You promised."

Without a thought he lifted his hand enough to tag the bottom hem of the now grubby white of the shirt she was wearing. He tugged at it playfully and nodded, eyes flanking down to briefly meet hers. DG just smiled and nodded in reply before stepping away, her hand reaching out to nab Glitch. The both of them were already tumbling into excited conversation as they headed arm in arm toward the warming fire.

* * *

"He'll show." Wyatt murmured, studying the tense set of her jaw while she chewed against the inside of her bottom lip.

He noted the barely perceptible way she was rocking her shoulders while she studied the darkened woods that surrounded them. Wyatt rolled his wrapped arm and flexed the muscle that Raw had, once again, put some tender heart into. He let his spine curve as he settled farther back into the log, the other elbow holding his body so that it was slightly angled toward her. The food that Raw had offered her sat uneaten beside her.

"DG." He murmured.

"I know." Her voice was terse and cutting. "I know. Don't freak out. Don't show emotion. Don't - "

"Hey." He cut under her flustered ranting with a gentling tone. "I didn't say that, baby. I've never said that."

"Do you think it's worth what we've lost?" A shard of firelight sparkled in the increasingly cold blue of her eyes. "Whatever we have now? Whatever this is? Is it worth what every one of us has now lost?"

"You can't measure the worth of a war only in gains or losses."

DG snorted in disbelief. "Then explain it to me. Cuz we've both lost more than we've gained. My parents? Maybe my real father? Your wife?"

He frowned at the glaring reality she was laying out between them in the heat of the fire. Wyatt sighed out and dug the heel of one of his boots in the dirt, watching the flames while he considered what answer might settle the jangling in her nerves. There wasn't necessarily an answer he could give that she couldn't wrestle into a negative in a situation like this.

"Wyatt?"

"You're right." He shrugged gently into the quiet pleading of her voice. "There is no answer."

DG frowned back to staring into the woods.

"That doesn't mean I would change a single moment since that door swung open." He didn't dare look back when her head swung back toward him. "I made a choice to stay with you, DG."

"The Mystic Man - "

"The Mystic Man is dead and rotting." He scuffed dirt hard into the fire, frustration flexing his legs. "Damn it, sweetheart. I made the choice. I walked away from that box, from Zero, that grave, my son…"

"I didn't ask you to - "

"You didn't have to." He blinked back up at her. "I made the choice. It wasn't just for you, DG. This is... It's our home. Whatever is left of it."

"And is it worth the losses?" there was a blatant challenge in her tone that straightened his spine and he moved quicker than she expected, his hand snapping out to latch her leg.

DG yelped slightly when he jerked her gracelessly down against the packed ground, the other hand lifting to cup over her mouth against drawing attention. Both her hands caught against his forearm as he leaned over her and pressed enough weight down to still her and shunt away her defeatist attitude. There was something conflicting written in her glance and he couldn't tell if it was caution or excitement.

"Hush up." His forehead met hers, the blues of both their eyes fighting in the firelight for the prize of prettiest. "Damn it, DG. Just shut up."

Her eyes clipped nearly closed obstinately and he jerked his hand back in surprise as she nipped her teeth light against the inside of his palm. He tried to draw back in frustration but her hands hand gripped desperately in the thin woven fabric of his shirt. Wyatt breathed out through his nose, surprised that she was still quiet, her eyes locked against his. It was a minute change in the color of her eyes, the relaxing of her forehead and cheeks. He could swear she almost smiled. Almost.

"You're sexy when you're frustrated, Tin Man." Her voice finally lulled quiet between them. There was still a sadness to her teasing though…

"Stop testing me, Princess." He growled the words against her jaw. "I'm just as stubborn as you are."

She nodded and both her hands dug him closer as she buried her face against the inside of his neck. One of her hands dragged low, pulling his hips to hers in a way that was unequivocally a beg for something more than a tease. Her mouth was moving up to his jaw, nipping light and then soothing delicately after. She led one of his hands to the heat between her legs and he shut his eyes as he stroked against the over-heated fabric of her snug black pants. He cupped his large palm against her and tried to even his breathing as she kissed up over his face.

"The first time I have you isn't going to be on the ground." He laid the words softly into her dusty hair, stroking up and onto her hip so that she wouldn't recoil from him. "Especially bloodied up and smelling like an unwashed Guild-ling."

"You assume you'll ever have me at all." her voice had gone cocky in response, elbows digging into the dirt while he leaned back.

Wyatt squinted a smug look over her supposedly passive face, "I already have you, Princess."

Fortunately, she didn't point out that a road, even a brick one, went two ways.

* * *

There was a buzzing ache in her head that she hadn't been able to shake since Glitch had brought the emerald back into her mother's waiting hand. Az stretched up from the cot and studied the way her mother was sleeping. There was a face pinching frown wearing on the normal beauty of the older woman's face and she stood still for a moment, watching the Queen. She could still see something of the mother that loved her and it made her swallow hard.

Az lifted a blanket that Kalm had happily brought to her, swinging it around her shoulders as she exited the small building. Quietly she eased toward the center of the main tribal grounds, realizing that the odd echo in her head actually got louder the farther she stepped from the emerald. Maybe it was warning. Maybe it was nothing. Maybe it was just tension building an ache in her ears…

She wasn't going back, though. Not now that she'd noticed the change.

She tracked the sound, stepping farther into the darkness in the direction of the growing pain behind her eyes.

* * *

"Stay here." He laid his fingers against her lips, hushing her with a sound from his throat as he stood.

"What are you doing?" DG hissed in confusion, half sleep crowding her eyes.

"We're not facing your mother until I've found your father." He leaned a kiss against her forehead and her hand swiped hard into the 'V' of his vest.

DG smiled up at him, that same proud smile she'd bared at the strategy table…

"Don't do that." He shook his head.

"Don't what?" She couldn't stop smiling at him.

Cain just loosed her fingers from the leather he wore, "Don't make it seem like my world revolves around you."

"Because it embarrasses you?" she tugged the duster he'd left laying over her legs a bit higher on her hip.

Wyatt just shook his head, "Because it's gonna go to your head if you think it's true."

"Spoilsport." She whispered loudly behind him.

He just lifted his hand as he silently stalked into the darkness that crowded in on them, his hand settled comfortably on the butt of his pistol.


	9. Chapter 9

He knew it was Cain before he nudged the muzzle of the weapon to the back of his head.

He did it anyhow, just for the selfish pleasure of having the upper hand against this man in particular.

Even a fleeting moment of pleasure was still a prize of pride.

Ahamo grinned smugly that he'd been the one to find the other. A bit of selfish comfort in the fact that he had a gun to this man's head. It was probably the only time he would have control in this relationship and he savored the moment before clicking the safety back on.

"You made yourself pretty obvious." He murmured and stepped back toward the now dampened fire he'd made and then outened. "I heard you coming a mile away."

"Intentionally." Wyatt turned and set his pistol back into the holster with a cocked glance toward the older man. "You enjoyed that."

Ahamo let a laugh cough up from is chest, "I did a little. DG?"

"She's fine." Wyatt watched her father gather up the things he hadn't been able to get to in his hurry to gain surprise. "Get a little lost?"

"My father," Ahamo nodded, "he was an avid hunter. When I was little he'd set me down somewhere in the woods and tell me that if I ever got lost, stay where I was. Someone would come find me."

"That's leaving a lot of faith in the hands of a dead man, isn't it?" Cain asked with squinted eyes.

Ahamo just smiled back at him, "We've both been dead men, Cain. People still have faith in the movements of our hands."

Wyatt cocked his head at the other man's words and followed him as he started into the darkness of the woods. They walked in a lagging silence toward where the older man had tied up the horses. He helped Ahamo loosen them and then thoughtlessly pulled himself up onto the mare, hushing her with crooning sounds and a bent hand to her neck. Cain looked up to find the other man staring at him with a perplexed look on his face, the darkness making it seem more accusatory than it probably was.

"I have no right to say anything about your relationship with my daughter." Ahamo pulled himself up into the saddle and stepped his horse closer to Cain's, handing over the reigns to DG's Pinto.

"And yet," Wyatt took them and spun a knot to his saddle pommel. "you seem to feel the need at the moment?"

Ahamo took a swilling breath, looking out into the darkness while he stowed his pack behind him on his saddle. "I would appreciate it if you could do what I could not."

Wyatt leaned his horse into a slow trot, the older man easily keeping up with him. "I don't follow."

"Lavender was the sweetest combination of both our daughters. Used to be." He continued, "The only thing I gave Dorothy was a sure hand with a pencil."

"Consort - "

"Don't let this break her." Ahamo gave him a sideways glare, jaw twitching in a clenching manner that had him surprised by the intensity.

"I don't control her, Consort." Cain forced his face passive. "I wouldn't dare try."

"Mmmm." Ahamo nodded, a forced smile thinning on his lips, "Of course not."

"If you have a problem - "

"There is no room for me to have a 'problem'." Ahamo reared his horse to an abrupt stop, his voice knifing through darkness, "I have no recourse and no reason, Mr Cain. Am I happy that she's gotten wide-eyed over a common highwayman? Damned far from it."

Wyatt jerked his horse back hard, shoulders sterned back and tight as he gritted his teeth together, eyes pinpointing bright but flaring his temper into the darkness. He didn't speak at first, idling the mare closer to the other man's horse.

"Is it that I'm common?" He dropped the words by each leaden syllable, "Or that I don't even want another worthless title? Or is it that she needs more substance than you've provided in the whole of her life?"

He was brightly surprised by the sudden gritting smile that Ahamo laid between them. When his eyes rose again to meet Cain's it was even wider than it had been. His teeth glared bright in the dark as he leaned forward and caught the younger man's vest lapel. Wyatt didn't flinch at the gripping fingers, just watched in curious silence.

"Never lose that." Ahamo whispered in what rang of pride, the sound of it confusing Cain. "Never give that up when it comes to her. She deserves every ounce of that fervor, Tin Man."

Cain drew his horse back, forcing the older man to break his hold. "Hadn't planned on it."

* * *

She hadn't had to go far, not really. Not even three quarters of a mile to the south, along the crumbling edge of the Old Road. She'd dropped the blanket maybe twenty minutes before, knowing she was onto something tangible when the moons had opened enough light for her to see a figure waiting quiet in her path. She knew already… She'd known that he'd been waiting inside their lines for half a day. It was a wonder that her mother hadn't already known…

Azkadellia stopped short of getting close enough to see the white that was highlighting his blonde hair. "You shouldn't be here."

Zero let up a snort of derision, "I shouldn't be anywhere, Princess. I should be dead."

Az swallowed the lump of fear that blocked in her throat, the buzzing behind her ears swelling to a tidal front force. "You will be soon enough."

He gave in another cynical laugh and twisted his body in a gracefully lyrical yet obviously mocking bow. Zero stood back straight and crossed his arms over his chest, blanked eyes slimming as he looked her over in curious scrutiny. His head shook minutely as he let his gaze wander lasciviously down her body and back up to her loose hair. A pleased noise rolled from his throat as he took a step forward. She couldn't help but flinch back.

"Two little Princesses." He spoke, one hand lifting and dancing back and forth with his sing-song tone. "But I only see one. Have I missed the other?"

Zero had taken another step closer and this time she'd found the will to stand still.

"Where's she gone? She's left you again." he stated with hushed malice, the same raised hand falling to reach toward her hair.

Az caught his fingers tightly, holding them in the air, squinting against the way the sound in her ears sailed into a wailing warning. She mentally clamped against it and, surprisingly, the sound hushed to a dull drone in her head. There was a vibrant hum but nothing more. Her fingers tightened and she caught the pleased smile that Zero was leaning over her.

"You're more beautiful now than you were before." His tone still had an edge to it, but his eyes were voided and glossy. "You could still rule, you know? Pretty little princess…"

* * *

"No." she sat up hard into the dying firelight, Cain's duster already kicked to the side and off her shifting legs.

It hadn't been a dream.

It had been real.

At least, part of it had been…

DG stood and stepped away from the fire, hands wiping her hair back off her face as she tried to grip onto her bearings. It was mostly quiet. She shook the image of her sister's hand being held down tightly by the flexed palm of a man she could only assume was Zero. The image broke cold over shoulders and she started toward the wagon that was stalled a few yards away. She heard steps behind her and turned sharply toward them when they nipped at her heels.

"Cain." She breathed out the sigh, a hand flattening to her stomach. "I didn't know you were back."

"We got back half an hour ago." He squinted a knowing glance between her and the wagon that stood unused behind her. "We were letting you sleep another half hour."

"You found Ahamo?" the smile that bent her lips was nearly enough to cover the worry that was crowding blue eyes. "He's here?"

"He'd gotten lost after losing sight of the truck." His hand set against the jut of his holster as he looked down over her. "Were you about to ditch us?"

DG breathed in through her nose, a stubborn quality paling her face. "Az… Zero's found her. But…it's strange. He's not hurting her. I don't think."

"Why injure what you can use as the lovely lure for a finely made trap?" Wyatt questioned quietly, glance burning on her. "A trap her sister, or parents, would happily walk right into."

"Don't patronize me." She tossed up before looking away, throat flushing at the realization that he was probably right.

"Don't keep secrets from me."

DG opened her mouth to reply but shut it tight and quick when she saw her father moving from the barely left light of the fire. He looked tired and older than he had since they'd met in the Unwanted. It saddened her slightly and she hooked a forced smile on her face. DG stepped easily into the way he moved to hug her, letting him sigh his arms against her shoulder, face in her hair.

"I'm glad you're safe." She put the same smile on as they leaned apart.

"The Princess thinks it's time we move." Cain said quietly, banking a glance toward the other man.

"Is that why she's halfway into the wagon?" Ahamo asked with a perked brow.

Cain nodded, "Seems to be."

"Yeah, yeah." She lifted her hands and stepped away from them in annoyance. "So I got busted. Can we go now?"

"Be faster without the wagon." Wyatt tipped his hand back toward the fire and watched the excited smile that lit her face when she realized all three horses had joined the one that had been drawing the wagon.

"You brought Jefferson back." She grinned and was already moving happily toward the pony.

"Jefferson?" Cain cocked a glance at her father.

"Slipper thing." Ahamo laughed at his outright confusion. "You wouldn't get it."

Wyatt rolled his eyes and moved in behind her, "Thankfully."

* * *

"This isn't the battle." His voice had iced quiet, boots scuffing the brick as he stepped back and pulled his hand from hers. "Not yet, Princess. I was just saying hello. Giving you a chance."

"You think that I'm afraid of you." She said gently after him, the thrum that had been radiating through her body finally settling as she calmed her breathing. "I can't afford fear."

Zero chuckled and stepped onto the crumbling road, letting the heel of one black boot dig up a brick before he toed it away. He looked back up at her and shook his head. One of his hands slipped out and toward her, palm up. Azkadellia shook her head but lifted her fingers so that her palm was in direct opposition to his, facing down. He cocked his head in question and inched his hand forward, trying to touch palm to palm.

She waited for his balance to lean a touch too far before she grabbed at his wrist and snapped all the force she could muster into the stretch of her fingers. The sound of Tutor's calm and urging voice was the simple memory she chose to have faith in as she laid out all the power she could muster into the touch. He howled angrily at her, scrambling to free himself from her scorching fingers, skin singeing at the pulsing touch points.

She took no joy in the pained noise he made as she finally disengaged his hand.

There was no pride either.

It hadn't been nearly enough power to stop him.

It was disappointing…

"Bitch." Zero spit at her feet and stepped back, his body bent over the way he was clutching his hand into his chest. "That was the wrong choice."

"The wrong choice is rarely made when it leads to gutless little bastards licking their wounds." Azkadellia heard something in her voice that mingled between her mother's clear tone and the Witch's angry inflection. The mix unnerved her but she stepped forward.

"You'll be dead soon." Az gentled, putting more stock in the same solid way her mother had always spoken than in the way the Witch had manipulated her voice. "Do you understand that?"

Zero tucked his bleeding and singed hand to his chest and offered up a twisted smirk that stopped her movements. His body backpedaled cautiously down the road, "We all die, Princess."

Azkadellia nodded and watched him slide into darkness, "Soon, Zero."

* * *

"Impressive." Lavender said a quietly as she could, voice stirring her daughter's nervous reverie.

Az startled easily in the darkness, jumping from the eerie sudden appearance of her mother. Lavender only offered a supportive smile and a dipping nod before motioning back in the direction the both of them had come. Az shook her head in complete confusion, a flush of hot red painting her throat as she sucked down oxygen in anger.

"Why didn't you… you could have stopped this."

"Not while you were so deftly handling the situation on your own." The older woman stalled her and tried to soothe her but Az recoiled at her mother's words.

"You could have killed him."

"Doubtful." Lavender murmured. "You know how drained I am."

"With the emerald…you could have finished it." Az pushed back and her chest rose hard as her breathing sped. "Why didn't you - "

"With the daughter I finally have back placed directly between me and my quarry?" Lavender murmured quietly and reached for her oldest child anyhow, fingers stroking the ends of dark hair. "Not a chance. Not unless I thought he was truly going to hurt you."

"He could have."

Lavender shook her head slowly, her eyes softening, "He can't hurt you, angel. Trust in that."

"What makes you so sure?" Azkadellia's voice had tipped slightly toward hysterics and her face had paled completely now that she could recount what had happened.

The Queen let both of her hands touch her daughter's shaking palm, lifting it up so that the both of them watched the green hued light fade slowly from a circled mark on her palm. It was a breath and then it was gone. Az was still shaking her head in disbelief. There was still an uncomfortable roiling in her stomach that led her to sway slightly. Her fingers were still tingling oddly.

"Zero is nothing." Lavender laughed a little at the mathematical logic in the statement. "And now you've proven it to yourself."

"I didn't need a lesson, mother." Az snapped her hand away. "You could have stopped this."

Lavender just watched as her daughter stepped slowly away from her, breathing evenly into sadness. "No, darling. I couldn't have."

She pulled the pocket watch out and blankly looked it over, sadly knowing that the emerald wouldn't respond to her touch any more now than it had when Ambrose had first handed it to her… Nothing happened, and so she followed her child silently through the trees and back to the quiet of the encampment.

* * *

It still took a few tense hours for them to ride in the direction that Raw had pointed them, his tips for not getting lost all relying on natural borders and outcroppings and creeks and more than likely giant Mobat shits. Wyatt was having a harder time tracking their way through the forest in the dark than he had hoped and finally it was a grunt of annoyed frustration while DG pranced her horse beside his still form that snapped the silent tension.

"Tin Man." Her hand stroked the now heavily stubbled line of his jaw from the side as she leaned down, her other hand leveling the saddle pommel as she smirked. "Get back on your damn horse and let me do this."

Wyatt couldn't help the smirk he gave her back as she cocked a smug glance down at him. He shrugged and whistled the mare, swinging back up onto her easily. Both his hands went up in concession as he relaxed in the saddle. Ahamo was watching them both in quiet interest. He grinned as DG started to her horse at a slow gait, prancing steps.

"She's tracking her sister." Ahamo murmured, "Or the emerald."

"Either way." Cain shrugged as the both of them followed. "I'm inclined to follow her very very quietly."

"It would seem that's the smartest avenue to take, my friend."

"Are we?" Cain hinted a grin at him. "Friends now?"

"I'd say you earned a grace period long before the Witch was killed." Ahamo just let his gaze drift back to his daughter. "She's a firecracker, isn't she?"

Wyatt stared at the straight line of her back and watched her hips as she rolled the horse into a faster gallop.

He decided he probably shouldn't answer with what he was truly thinking.

* * *

Az felt Kalm grasp at her fingers, tugging on them as the light began to filter in through the open door. She hadn't slept at all, just laid quiet while trying to breathe herself calm. It had barely worked until the boy had quietly stepped in, shyly smiling at her mother before reaching for her. He gave Az a toothy grin and puffed up his chest a little.

"Az listen." He nodded, "Listen loud."

She frowned and sat up quietly, still holding tight to his fingers while her head cocked toward the pink tinged light that was growing wider into the room. There was a warm flood of something sentimental opening in her chest and if she listened, listened loud as he had suggested… she could hear the rhythmic thumping.

"DG." She stood and felt her mother stand as well. "DG's here."

Lavender watched the boy tug her daughter toward the door and tried to find the same path her daughter had traced… Nothing.

Nothing except heat in her hands and a flush that said…

"Your father's with her."

Finally. Finally she could feel something warm and comforting between the four of them.

"I know." Azkadellia was already through the door and into the morning light.

* * *

He stayed back from the way the family met happy and excited. His hand stayed soothing on his horse's side as Kalm stepped away from the four of them and the way they were laughingly trying to talk over one another. It wasn't an uncomfortable separation, he just didn't feel as though it was his place to break between DG and Azkadellia's clenched hands. She needed to lace her sister's fingers and it was just as easy for him to wipe down the mare with soothing and hushing noises before letting her roam a little for food.

"Cain happy too." Kalm noticed it immediately.

"Sure." He smiled and nodded gently before ruffling a comforting hand at the boy's knotted hair, "Just not my place."

"Wants to be." Kalm cast a glance back to the way DG was trailing a sad look of confusion at him.

"Not yet." Wyatt shook his head and aimed a hand at the saddle. "Wanna give her a go?"

Kalm just grinned at him in excitement, one of his hands already reaching for the horse's nose to give her a good natured scratch. "Cain means it."

"Of course I do." He offered both hands and hauled the child up easily, settling him on the saddle before wrapping the reigns loosely around his palm. "Hold on, kid."

"Kalm hold."

It did seem a bit like that, he thought.

His eyes roved toward the royal family and the way they were already starting into a hushed but serious conversation.

The calm hold.

The odd still before the storm.

* * *

"Glitch and Raw and Jonah are heading back in the wagon." She offered quietly, their shoulders rubbing together while they shared a meager meal of fresh fruit. "The Guild is still guarding the edge."

"The males have been gone a day." Az nodded agreement, "At the least."

DG finally stared over her sister's face, noticing that there was more strength there than there had been when they had separated, her eyes were clearer, "Did all of it actually happen? What I saw?"

"I would imagine that you were seeing it in my time." The older of the two murmured. "I was reaching for you…"

"Guess what?" DG smiled wide at her and nudged their shoulders together.

"What?" Az was very nearly smiling.

"I reached back."

The older woman kissed her light against the cheek and DG couldn't help the smile that laid comfortable on her lips.

* * *

She didn't feel guilty in the least for watching him. It wasn't like he hadn't interrupted breakfast with her sister and told her exactly where he was going, what he was doing, and how long he'd be there. He'd very nearly written it as a gilded invitation.

DG lowered her body down to the edge of the water in a crouch, a stone already caught up in her fingers. She stood again as he broke the surface of the water, wiping it back from his eyes and through his short trimmed hair. Her hand drew back and she put enough of a flick into the turn of her wrist that she skipped the stone directly to the left of him. Cain snapped his head up abruptly, eyes latching onto her and brightening in the reflection of the light on the water. She reached for the gun he'd left on the bank.

"What will you do, Mr Cain?" she teased at him and swung his holster from her fingertips. "Your gun's up here."

"You think I'm afraid of you?" he cocked his head and rubbed water against his chest and onto the shoulder that was still looking a furious red. "Come down here."

"Nope." DG shook her head and set his gun down gently, both her hands setting to her hips, "You come up here."

"I don't take orders from kids." He playfully splashed water up onto the shore.

"Captain Cain." She angled her head, letting her eyes slide over the way the water went in rivulets down his muscled upper body, enough sparse hair spattered over his chest to catch some playful droplets. "Come up here."

"That's my Princess." His voice was hushed enough that she could barely hear it over the rippling of the water.

"You didn't piss in there, did you?" she smirked as he started walking, eyes stuck on the way the water level receded down his trim stomach slowly. "I'm pretty sure that's drinking water."

"You have a crass mouth sometimes, Princess."

"Jesus Christ." Her face flushed when his pale hips broke the surface of the water and she blinked up at his face after getting a full frontal view. "Next time just fucking shoot me."

"See?" he grinned as he stepped higher up the bank and wiped water from off his neck, his eyes bright in amusement. "Did you think I was wearing my pants in there?"

"A little warning." She shrugged playfully. "I could have had a heart attack from the shock of seeing you without…you know."

"My clothes?" Wyatt stepped into the grass, body already leading up on her in a way that said he was winning something. "Sweetheart, how do you think things are going to work out if we don't ever take off our clothes?"

"I'm not embarrassed." Her hand tipped forward to trace a line of water on his stomach.

"Then why are you that same pretty pink?" his hands braced her hips and dug her forward tightly, his head cocked back slightly as he smirked at her.

DG lifted her head at him, eyes lidded as she pressed a palm flat to his chest between them. The other hand teased down his stomach and he breathed through clenched teeth as he let his eyes roam over her face.

"We don't have a lot of time." He leaned in and trapped his mouth against her ear, dropping kisses down to her throat. "I didn't expect much."

She just sloped her hand down and wrapped long fingers around his length, turned her head into the way he groaned her name against her throat. "Enough time."

Wyatt nipped against her neck, sucking down as she started slowly stroking him, one of his hands jerked up into her hair and dug in while the other stayed clenched to her arm, keeping it between them. DG laid a moan into his cheek as he let his breathing go ragged against her jaw as he hardened in her hand. Her other hand lifted to wipe the stubble that he hadn't cleared off his jaw.

"Don't shave yet." She tapped his chin before kissing where her fingers had been.

Wyatt just groaned a nod and leaned his forehead into hers, both his hands raising to clamp at the back of her neck while she worked slick hot skin with quickening fingers. His eyes followed her hand while she pulled him closer, her lips pressing the corner of his mouth. She tried to shift down, tried to move to back up a teasing promise she'd once made and he just groaned tighter into her, forehead driving against hers.

"Look at me, Wyatt." She kissed him hard to draw his attention back, controlling the kiss so that it was her tongue driving in on him while she sped her hand.

He lifted the iced blue of his eyes so that he could watch the lusted heat of hers. She could see his jaw flex as he tried to even his breathing, her own breathing as calm as she could manage while she brought him closer. His hands tightened against the back of her neck and he tried to shift away, her entire front already damp from the water that layered his now scorching skin.

"Don't." She commanded quietly and shifted slightly to his side, one of his hands staying as her neck while the other gripped desperately against her wrist. "Don't go anywhere, Tin Man."

"I'm not a Tin Man." He growled and tipped his head back, hips starting to thrust reflexively into the now quicker movements of her long and soft fingers.

"You are to me." She kissed the words at his jaw. "You can let go any time. I've got you."

His hand jerked into the hair at the base of her neck and his mouth crashed against hers as he came hard. He poured the groan into her mouth as she softened her touches to barely there, her body laying vertically into the way he sagged against her. He broke the kiss as roughly as he'd started it, lungs sucking down as much oxygen as possible. DG smiled into the sated noise he laid out as he swung a hug around her, dragging her hips too close to keep moving as he let his face ride into her dark hair. She tugged both arms up forcefully to loop his neck as he finally started soothing his breathing to a calmer rhythm.

"That's my princess." She could tell he was smiling into her hair.

"You accused me of being crass." Her fingers pinched the back of his tensely chorded neck. "And then - "

"You waved my gun in my face." He countered playfully.

"You waved your gun in my face." She countered.

The laughter he tossed into her hair gave her the easiest smile she'd had since slipping through.


	10. Chapter 10

He did watch her bathe, eyes following the subtle curves of her body in between watching the trees. Cain smirked easily while he tugged one of his boots back on, his holster hooked awkwardly over one shoulder. She'd left him with a sweet kiss and a smile and stripped her clothes on her way into the water, eyes turning back to him on a tease.

"Shouldn't you be making sure that no one is trying to kill me?" DG let her voice carry as he tugged the other boot on as well, his eyes still latched on her.

"I am, Princess."

Wyatt stretched his body enough to affix his holster properly, strapping the bottom bracer tight to his thigh. His glance fell quiet over the way she was scrubbing her hands through her hair, body arched back in the water so that he could watch the lake lap against the top curve of each breast. He was still burning hot from her touch and the sight of water shining her skin wasn't much helping to soothe the knot in his lower stomach.

"DG." He stood straight, eyes sweeping the tree line to his left, hand already grappling his pistol. "If I tell you to dive - "

"I get it." Her voice was hushed and her shoulders sank slow and quiet into the water, jaw tripping the edge while she watched the same bank his eyes were focused on.

He could hear it.

Something… He could hear…

At least two.

But they were making too much noise… They were too obvious.

"Stay there." One hand aimed toward her while the other cocked the pistol up, his booted feet sliding slightly on the muddy embankment but each step holding.

She watched him quietly, his movements so sure and lean and tight. He was a cop…there was no other explanation for the ease of well practiced and silent movement. His waist twisted as he turned his upper body sidelong to keep from tangling up in the brush. His eyes, flaring a brighter blue than white paint under a blacklight, so intently focused on what he was doing. A goddamn cop, through and through. And in that moment, fear closing her throat slightly, she nearly laughed.

She'd spent years running from cops…

Now she was damn near bedding one.

Her hands clenched as he reached a hand through the knotted and twisted hedge, the pistol aimed just above the reach of his wrist. DG jumped at the way his hand snapped back toward his chest, drawing a stumbling man through the brush in a wreckless and angry fashion. He swung the other man down toward the water and pressed the gaping open mouth of the gun to the stranger's temple. Cain let his boots slag and splash into the water, twisting both their bodies to face away from her so that he could address someone else.

"I'll drop a bullet in his skull if you don't get your skinny ass out here."

DG ducked a little lower in the water, a smug smile crowding her lips but fading quickly as another man creeped through the brush, his hands raised. He was bloodied and pale, face tired and sagging as much as his shoulders. Without a word he dropped to his knees in the mud.

"Jeb sent us." He looked up at Cain quietly. "We tracked you, reported back, and he sent a message back with us."

Wyatt cocked his head slowly and re-fixed his grip against the other man's neck, digging the gun closer to skin. The man on his knees, no more than twenty five, looked past him and offered her a weary nodding smile. DG flushed slightly in embarrassment but it didn't last as his eyes lifted back to the former Tin Man.

"Your wife's favorite color was blue." He murmured gently and sagged his shoulders lower. "And on her birthday you always gave her - "

"Okay." Wyatt nodded and swallowed to hush him. "I get it. How'd you get through the lines?"

"The Viewers." The man he was aiming the pistol at wheezed quietly. "They knew we weren't lying."

"I'll test that theory again if you don't mind." He retorted and pushed the man he was holding toward the bank, motioning for the other to follow with the nose of the pistol.

DG watched him start to walk away and was surprised at the intense glance he suddenly gave her as he followed them. He pointed silently to her clothes and she just nodded in return, already standing a little straighter in the water. A smile started to twinge his thin lips but he shook it off, focusing again on the other two men as he sped his steps.

* * *

She watched them quietly, making sure they'd all broken their way back toward camp before dipping back underwater to clear her head.

She was prying the knots from her hair as she watched him speak at a near silent decibel with the two men and her parents. Her fingers were tangling up easily in frustration and she jumped when she felt a hand press her shoulder. It was a swift intake of oxygen before she realized that it was her sister.

"You're going to rip it clear off your head." Az murmured, "Just stop a minute."

"I wanna know what they're saying."

"Then listen." Az shrugged and pushed the younger woman to sit on a crudely made wooden bench, her slow and careful fingers gently pulling apart the knots. "Listen very well."

DG arched a brow and focused on the small group. She listened but could only hear the sound of the camp around her, brows furrowing as she blew out a breath through pursed lips. A feeling of relaxation broke over her as Azkadellia bent her head down as well, their eyes both aimed in the same direction.

"Just listen, Deeg." She urged, her voice humming support. "Can you hear them?"

Suddenly their voices thrummed as though they weren't more than a foot away and DG jumped at the change. Az's fingers kept soothing through her hair and the older sister sat up with a proud smile. They were discussing the army that Jeb had been carefully rebuilding back in Central City. The advisors and council members that had resurfaced and were waiting back at the Tower. The scientists, the artists, the teachers, the underground… DG listened quietly.

Cain was suggesting they stay still for a day, stay until the re-enforcements that Jeb had sent could cover them. There was clear and untainted trust in his voice and she heard the nervous concern in her mother's response. Still… He persuaded the Queen with quiet conviction. It was completely insane how easily he could –

"Because he's logical." Az nodded. "Mother likes a logical argument. She likes that he doesn't trust the gray in-between area. He's a very linear man."

"I'm not at all like that." DG spoke gently.

"That's why he's smitten with you." Az tugged playfully at a wet lock of hair.

"Smitten?" DG cocked a glance back. "Thanks for the Cliff Notes, Jane Austin."

Az just quirked her a confused glance and then shook it off, laying her sister's damp hair flat to her thinning shoulders and moved to settle beside her. "The Guilds are combining, joining to restore the line. That's what he's read in the letter that has him so excited."

"How do you know?"

Az just shrugged in confused surprise. "I…I don't actually know. I just know."

"Not fair." DG pouted and playfully shoved at her shoulder at her sister.

Azkadellia smiled comfortably back. "You would too if you would just listen more, DG. Just listen."

DG let out a slow breath and turned her head forward again, letting her chin settle onto her hand as she continued to eavesdrop on their conversation.

* * *

"Princess." Glitch was grinning widely, his hands perched on his hips as he stood straight in the back of the wagon. "Princess."

DG laughed at the way he nodded between the two sisters and headed toward the wagon, leaning comfortably against the edge of it so that she was looking up at him. He grinned and crouched down, tapping a finger on her forehead with an even wider grin. Az had moved slowly in behind her but shifted toward the end of the wagon, fingers lifting the worn tarp that was thrown over everything.

"Thankfully," she pulled it up higher, "he remembered clean clothing."

"How about waffles?" DG asked playfully.

"No waffles." He shook his head and stretched over the side of the wagon, letting his feet rush the dust up so that he could lean in beside her. "Some fruits and breads though."

"Good enough." She shrugged and let her head lean onto his shoulder. "I'm glad you and Raw are safe."

"Same here." He nodded and let his chin nudge onto the top of her head. "Could use a rest, though."

"I know what you mean." She whispered quietly, watching as across the encampment Kalm greeted both Raw and Jonah. "I just want to be there."

"We'll get there." He nodded and rubbed a soothing hand on her back. "Food or clothes first?"

"I think Az is itching to change into something clean." She laughed the words out as she watched her sister rifle through a bag of clothing. "Food later."

* * *

"I'm inclined to wait it out." Ahamo said gently. "At least for the night. If Cain is right in trusting this message then we gain more support. If he is not, we stage a battle from a defendable point instead of the middle of the Old Road."

Lavender nodded and relaxed her hands on her hips, turning her eyes down over his tired face. She let the fingers of one hand out to stretch against his pale but blonde-gray stubbled cheek. His eyes shut in silence as he turned his jaw warm into the smooth palm of her hand. Quietly she stepped into the slumped way he was sitting on the cot that she'd been using, her hands soothing into his hair while he laid his face against her stomach.

"Ambrose gave me the emerald." She spoke as softly as she could so as not to disturb the comfort he had found.

"That's good." His words were a mumble against her.

"I can't wield it." She breathed out slowly, knowing her voice was husky with defeat.

Ahamo looked up sharply, eyes narrowing while color filled his face again. He stood up against the front of her body, head shaking in a barely perceptible fashion. Lavender just shook her head back in answer, pulling the pocket watch out and opening it carefully. The stone sad dimly in it's facet and she just angled it sadly toward him. There was no light to it. It was a dull and reflectionless green.

"I don't understand."

"It doesn't respond to me anymore." There was an emotionless tone to the words. "No pull. No give and take. Nothing."

"You can't hear it?"

She just shook her head quietly, eyes watery as she looked back up at him. "They'll both hear it."

"Neither of them will want it." He closed it up in her hand and pushed it down and out of their sight.

Lavender just breathed in slowly, "I'm not sure… the Zone doesn't care what they want, Ahamo. It's their responsibility. It's why we have done everything…all the steps we took."

"Do not tell them." He just cupped her face in both his hands. "Not yet."

"It needs to be in their hands before we lose this battle." She countered but he hushed her quiet, eyes focusing on the light tone of hers.

"Just not yet."

* * *

He watched the way she wiped tired at her eyes but still held the smile she'd been sharing with everyone around the dinner fire. Her fingers broke against her temple, rubbing against an unknown annoyance while Glitch entertained her and Tutor with a story that seemed big enough to fill a theatre. The other man's dramatic movements and faces at least drawing her to laugh here and there while he spoke.

Wyatt leaned his good shoulder against a poplar and slowly chewed on the bread that Raw had brought him from the wooden table they'd set up on the opposite side of the fire. The Viewer had smiled at him in a way that was more welcoming and familial than ever before, then just stepped away quietly, leaving him to his own quiet. He liked that… That Fuzzy knew when to just let him be.

His eyes trained over the Viewer and the way he was speaking quietly between Ahamo and Azkadellia, his face soft and very nearly happy in the firelight. There were other Viewers there, a few Guild members. The two rebel soldiers were stuffing as much food into their hungry mouths as they could manage, faces pale in the firelight. Kalm was already cuddled into the bend of Az's knee, his eyes sliding shut and snapping back open before repeating the weary action. Lavender was watching between the two familiar groups with a smile on her lips was so seemingly out of character that it made him smile reflexively.

"Hiding out?"

"More comfortable when I'm not crowded in." he answered Jonah gently and chewed on a piece of bread. "You?"

"Don't really know anybody but you, Captain." The older man let his burly arms cross over his chest as he looked toward the fire. "Feelin' a bit jittery."

Cain just nodded and turned a glance back to DG, realizing that her eyes were trained silently on him as Glitch got caught up in a conversation with the Queen. He offered a quiet smile to the way she was studying him and she just blinked tiredly at him in response. Wyatt frowned and handed the last of the bread over to his friend, putting up a hand and offering it in her direction.

"You're gonna ditch me too?" Hays asked with a feigned disappointment, "Some gentleman you are."

Wyatt just smiled as she stood and slowly stepped toward him, her fingers ruffling Kalm's hair as he slept. "Find another dance partner, Hays."

"Can't." the other man huffed and bit into the bread, "I'm too heartbroken."

"You'll get over it."

As her fingers tangled up into his palm he pulled her close into his chest, wrapping her up in a comforting hold. DG laid her cheek against his shoulder and tucked tight into his chest, hiding her face down into his throat. Cain just swallowed down the scent of her and leaned his cheek to the top of her head, eyes glaring toward his friend.

Jonah rolled his eyes, "Yeah, yeah. I get it."

"Take first watch for me?"

Hays just threw a hand back at him that he knew was a motion of assent.

* * *

"Do I get to see this letter?"

Wyatt just watched her stretch easily into the tented hut that Raw had shown him to toward the edge of the encampment. He nodded and aimed his fingers toward the cot that had been set up for him, watching her pick it up and skim over it while he toed off his boots. Her eyes squinted in the mostly dark to read the messy scrawl his son had laid over the paper. Jeb's handwriting left quite a bit to be desired but she lifted it and glanced up at him while he unstrapped his holster.

"You believe in it?"

He breathed in through his nose, lips pressed tight, "I want to. I don't trust it entirely but… I want to."

DG just nodded and set it back to his cot before turning back to him. One of her hands had lifted again to rub against her face and Wyatt stepped into the way her body was tensed in the center of the hut. Both his hands pulled down from hers as he looked over her pale and tensed face.

"You haven't been yourself."

"My head is screaming." She whispered and tightened up even more at the way he tried to lift her chin, her eyes shut.

"DG."

"Just…" both her hands covered his. "It won't stop."

"I don't know what - "

"Az told me to listen and as soon as I started I couldn't stop." She was shaking her head in confusion and he frowned over the uncomfortable set of her pert lips. "Voices, thoughts, emotions, and this…hum. It won't stop."

"Okay."

He let both hands slide to her arms as he started walking her backwards toward the cot. She fought him at first but he angled her down to sit on the cot, bending his body to crouch before her while his hands massaged her calves. Wyatt hushed her with a lulling sound and bent his hands to pull at her boots, tugging them off slowly. He smiled back up when he realized her fingers were teasing and tugging his short cut hair. Her eyes were lidded and the blue had darkened.

"Dorothy." He smirked as he said it. "Not the name I would have chosen for a girl like you."

"I hate it." She whispered and let her finger trace the scar on his eyebrow. "It's never felt right."

He laid his face down against her thighs, hands still rubbing comfort into the backs of her calves while her palm crowned his head. "This feels right."

There was a beat of silence while her finger curved the shell of his ear. "What did you used to give her every birthday?"

Wyatt lifted his head sharply, eyes tightening on the pale serious of her face. "Don't."

She stared at him for a moment and he could see the choices in her face. At first it seemed as though she was going to push the issue, force it out of him. But her eyes softened at the way he was staring afraid at her. It wasn't a question of a happy memory, it was a question that would press the repeat of unhappy ones.

DG rubbed the heel of her palm against the stubble on his jaw and nodded as he started to lean up, letting him kiss her hard as his hands scrabbled at the thin material of the once white shirt she was still wearing. He sucked against her bottom lip as he pulled away, ignoring the unhappy moan she made at the movement before he tugged the shirt up over her head.

"Shhh." He kissed at her forehead and then down one temple, a hand bracing the back of her neck while the other stroked the material of her bra. His thumb and forefinger found and tracked her nipple through the fabric while he kissed her softly again. "She told you to listen?"

DG just nodded in return, letting him lay her back against the cot, his hand settling her head back while he leaned over her body. Wyatt dragged his mouth down her throat, using his nose to nudge up her jaw so that he could suck hard and teasing against the reddened flush on her neck. DG let her hand catch against his shirt, fingers tangling up on his holster.

"Listen to me, Princess." He whispered down over her breasts, tongue rasping just over the curve of her bra line. "Just me."

Her breath caught up in her chest at the husky warm drop of his voice over saliva moistened skin. Her back arched as he dropped his mouth farther, closing it against her hardened nipple through the fabric while his hand pushed her legs apart. He aimed his body between her legs while his teeth rubbed and nipped on her. Both her hands braced on his shoulders and she dug against the fabric of his shirt.

"Wyatt."

"I'm right here." He smiled up over her and straightened his body, drawing the holster off and laying it to the packed floor beside her feet. "Hear me?"

She just smiled as she watched him draw off the vest, letting it drop as well. "You're a tease, Tin Man."

He smugly smirked back at her, pulling her hand up to his belt as he started undoing to the buttons of her shirt, "Tin Men follow through."

DG sat up enough to undo the belt, mouth laying down the open line of his shirt while he bent his head into her hair, drawing in the smell of water on her. He kept her head close with one hand while he replaced her fingers with the other, tugging open his belt and pants before leaning down to kiss her again. She made a surprised noise as he nudged her back onto the cot again, leaning onto his knees between her legs.

"Your heartbeat's faster than mine." She toyed her fingers against the tip of his ear and he shied his head away from her fingers.

"Hush. I'm concentrating." He countered and used both hands to skim her pants down off her hips, pulling a surprised noise from her when he stripped her bare, his eyes intense on her face.

She lay back as he leaned far enough away to strip the clothes away, a hand wiping her hair off her face while she felt the heat of his body line back between her legs, his hands soothing on her thighs while he started laying kisses down her stomach. She closed her eyes, moaning at the teasing way he moved down and then back up, dipping lower with each pass. She focused on the ragged but continuous rhythm of his breathing, feeling her own start to match it as his calloused palms warmed the insides of her thighs.

"You hear me?" he kissed the words against her pelvic bone and before she could answer he'd already slid a finger against warm wetness.

DG moaned a noise of agreement and let her legs loosen and relax as he slid his finger inside her, thumb rounding up against her clit while he kissed lower, mouth slowly and teasingly meeting his fingers. She gasped hard as he added another finger and let his tongue and thumb fight back and forth over her clit. Wyatt raised his head, watching the way she was arching still fabric layered breasts up off the mattress, smiling as she lifted her jaw. Her hips bucked against him as he started a slow, tantalizing rhythm with two fingers inside her. His other hand lifted one of her legs and bent her foot up against his good shoulder while he let his tongue taste at her again.

"Jesus Christ." DG dug her fingers into her hair.

"Shhh." He murmured against her thigh and nipped at her.

He kept his fingers at her, speeding the rhythm slowly, allowing it to build while he bent his mouth to her again, closing his lips and tongue on her clit. He sucked hard at it, breathing in the smell of her before letting his tongue and teeth strafe against her. Her hips were driving down at him and then rising to meet each put of his fingers and he could barely see properly when he looked up over her entirely arched body.

"You look so beautiful," He whispered into her thigh. "Princess."

"Wyatt?" she whispered and finally opened her eyes, the color a furious riot of blues and greens

"Hmm?" he drew his fingers out entirely and then plunged one back deep into her, forcing her to shudder against his hand.

"Shut up." Both her hands gripped to his neck and she pulled as she laid her legs open, drawing his body up against hers.

"I told you to - "

"I can hear everything in you even if you're silent." She answered breathlessly and jerked him into a rough kiss, both her legs lifting to wrap against his still clothed hips, clamping him down so that he had to support his weight with a pushing arm.

He ignored the emotion she'd let into the words, swallowing at his own sighing response as their tongues met. Her arms had wrapped against his shoulders and he used the hand that wasn't holding him above her to slide under her hips, lifting her into his now nearly full erection. DG smiled into the kiss and he could feel it as she pulled back, eyes meeting his.

"Pants off, Captain." Her eyes were a bright blue as she smirked at him.

He just nodded and leaned back, pushing the undone pants off his hips slowly. A forced breath, and then another to slow his breathing. Wyatt let his eyes fall over the way she was relaxed beneath him and he smiled into the waiting way her fingers were reaching for his stomach.

He pushed up on his feet and leaned over her, letting one arm hold his weight against the giving fabric of the cot while the other rubbed over her breasts, tugging at the fabric. DG laughed and leaned back a hand, loosing the bra so that she could draw it from her arms. He waited until she was occupied, trying to untangle herself before he lined his length against her, rubbing the tip into the wet heat between her legs. Her eyes fluttered at the touch and he watched her head drive back as he edged the head of his penis just against her, barely pressing there.

Her eyes lifted to match his, face softening while she pushed the offending fabric away and reached for his face, "Shhh."

"I didn't say anything." He whispered and drew one of her legs up to hook his hip.

DG shook her head and sat up against him, kissing his chest, "You don't have to. It's okay."

"I don't want to - "

She just smiled up at him and drew his hand between them, sliding his fingers into her wetness so that they were rubbing her clit together. "You're not going to hurt me. You can't."

"DG." His eyes slid closed as he resisted the urge to just grind hard into her, "I can hurt you. In a lot of ways."

"No." she lifted her damp fingers against his lips, letting him suck one of them into his mouth, his normally bright eyes still closed. "You can't. Look at me."

He opened his eyes and kissed her fingertip as she pulled from his lips. She leaned up and kissed him lightly, licking at his bottom lip before she rested back against the cot, her head arching back while a loose palm flexed around the bunched muscle of the arm holding his weight. Wyatt leaned down and laid his mouth between her breasts, driving his hips hard forward so that he slid tight and deep into her. The moan she slacked against the top of his head was enough to match the groan he exhaled against the inside curve of one of her breasts.

"Shhh." She whispered against his hair. "Stop worrying. Stop thinking."

"I can't." he blinked up at her and slowly started sliding out of her, smiling when he thrust back in tight and she moaned loudly again.

He watched her jaw bank up and he bent his mouth to latch against a nipple, one hand holding his body in an arch over her while the other gripped her thigh against his hip. He drove hard in and out of her, resting in the way she was rubbing the back of his head and keeping his mouth latched against her. Her other hand had lowered to rub against his flexed back. She was scraping against his skin faintly and a red flush was rising under her nails. She dug again and he hissed against the flare of pain.

"Stop thinking, Wyatt." She breathed out on a moan. "It's blocking me."

"I don't - "

The hand that had been against his head lifted his face hard, palm cupping against his stubbly jaw, "Stop blocking me. Don't keep me out when I've already let you in."

He leaned up, matching their bodies and letting the hand that had been gripping her thigh slide between them to rub hard against her clit. His forehead bent against hers as he sped his thrusts, intentionally countering the rhythm with the fingers against her clit. The opposition of movements had her hips shivering into him. His bright eyes met hers and she felt the cold that was still somewhere between them break, his body starting to stagger and shudder while she smiled wide into the feeling of him giving in.

"I can't make it last." There was a weakened apology in his tone. "DG."

"I know." She clenched around him as he kept driving into her. "You don't have to."

"It's been…"

She hushed him again and drew his head down, kissing him warmly while he shivered into her. She clenched around him every time he moved, tightening and clamping her muscles so that he was groaning hard and rough against her throat as he dug his jaw down. Her mouth met his ear and she kissed against it.

"You hear me, Tin Man?" she whispered and he jacked his hips into her hard. "Let go. Give me everything."

He came hard, fingers pinching against her clit, still trying to work against her while his body shattered into her. DG relaxed in the spread of wet heat and felt him suck his mouth against her throat. The possessive action and the tease of his fingers and the warmth of him tight inside her broke her. She whimpered into the way he pushed his softening length deeper as she came against him, her legs both lifting to wrap around his hips.

"I'll move in a second." He shuddered the words into the flood of dark hair that he'd pressed his face into.

"You're fine." She murmured and let her head turned to lay against his. "I like you inside me."

Wyatt groaned and turned open eyes to find the sated and pleased way she was looking at him. He smiled back and shifted the hand that was between them up to her hip, rubbing softly there for a moment before he caught her mouth in a kiss. He blinked his eyes closed and laid his forehead against the thrust of her collarbone. DG scraped both hands up his sweat layered back, smirking when he flinched at the scraped marks she'd left on the uninjured shoulder.

"I gotta move, sweetheart." He lifted his head and looked down over the pink flush over her breasts, his hand shifting back to slowly slide from inside her.

DG whimpered lightly when he pulled out of her and wiped both her hands over her face, smirking silently when he moved back and lifted both her legs to lay her the right way on the cot. Her hand went back as he tipped her on her side and slid up against her back. She pulled his hips close against her backside, moaning as he rubbed his length between the backs of her thighs. His kisses dropped against the back of her neck and he reached for his duster, pulling it over the both of their hips.

"Don't block me." She whispered out the beg as he let her use his arm for a pillow.

Wyatt just nuzzled his face into her hair and curved a palm up under one of her breasts, rubbing slow and soft. "It was a fair trade, Princess. I don't go back."

She smiled and slid her eyes closed. "Tin Men follow through."

"That's right." He closed his palm around her breast. "Now go to sleep."

She let humor into her voice, "Wyatt?"

"Shhh." He laughed soft into her hair. "Go to sleep."


	11. Chapter 11

"I have to take watch." He nuzzled the words against the warm spot behind her ear and smirked when she reached up to bat light fingers at his face.

It had been only an hour, maybe, with his large body curled and curved tight around her. DG gave off a grunting noise of disagreement and shifted, rolling into him so that she could forcibly wedge her thigh between his. She smirked into the way he grunted and leaned his shoulders back until she'd gotten comfortable against his warm chest before wrapping around her again.

"I mean it, Princess." This time the words pressed her forehead just before a couple chaste kisses. "It's my turn."

She growled another noise at him and lifted her head, arching her upper body so that she could reach his mouth with her own. Wyatt laid back slightly as she shut him up with a slow and teasing kiss, all breath and taunting nips while she stretched out over his chest. He jerked the duster up over her hips and back before wrapping his arms tight around her shoulders, letting her body rest full onto his chest. DG leaned her chin against his collarbone, looking up from under dark eyelashes, a pout pursing her lips out. Her hair was mussed and wild around her head and he used gentle fingers to rub through the waves.

"You can't leave." She grumbled. "I'm cold."

"Raw left some blankets." He rubbed his lips on her forehead. "Come on."

"No." she spread her body out full over his chest so that when she tipped her head down he could breathe in the smell of her hair.

Cain rolled his eyes and lifted her up a measure off his chest, forcing her to lay back with a glare as he crawled out from under the warm spread of her body. It was cool in the uninsulated tent and he felt his shoulders reflexively tighten against the chill. DG reached off the side of the cot and pinched his hip as he tried to move away, a laugh bubbling off her lips when he slapped at her fingers.

"You'll come back, right?" she asked, letting her head lag to the side so that she could watch him start drawing his clothes back on.

Once his pants were buckled on his hips he reached for the hide blanket that their friend had left him and laid it out over her, leaning down over her, "I'll be back."

DG let her palm flatten against his chest, breathing in slowly as she felt and heard his heartbeat. It was rhythmic, steady, true. He wasn't lying. She could hear faith and honesty in his voice. It was solid and thrummed through his vocal chords in a way that she hadn't necessarily noticed before. Her fingertips slid down his stomach and then she tucked under the blanket, curling over to watch as he finished getting dressed.

"Be nice to Jonah." She spoke softly, "He deserves a little trust."

"What did I tell you about trusting people in the O.Z.?" he cocked a blank glance over her as he wincingly drew his shirt over the furrowed marks she'd left on his back.

DG frowned at his sudden return to pessimism, "I trust you. I trust my family. Glitch and Raw."

Cain sighed over her and went quiet, watching her as he buttoned his shirt closed. She was watching him from a curled up position, her hair spread wide and wild while tucked under his jacket and the blanket. He felt a smile perk his lips when he realized he wasn't getting the duster back while he was on watch. He nodded agreement with the words she had spoken but didn't respond, still cautious when it came to the other man.

Had it just been him, had he been alone, maybe he would have been more willing to trust.

Now it was Wyatt Cain, Captain of the Royal Guard, bodyguard to a couple heiresses.

It left him unsettled.

Too unsettled to trust a man that he hadn't worked with in over a decade.

"I'll be nice." He nodded and tugged his vest on. "Get some sleep while I'm gone."

"Yes, sir." She nodded and cuddled down tighter, her body curling up tight.

"DG…" he wasn't sure why he said her name. He'd just wanted to.

"You promised to come back." She mumbled from beneath the blanket.

Cain just nodded with a smirk and looped up the holster from the floor, checking the pistol out of habit, "It seems that I've promised you a great many things already, Princess."

* * *

He cocked a smirk at the knowing way the older man was shaking his head and clearing a noise from deep in his throat. He couldn't help the way it fleshed into a full blown grin, eyes meeting Jonah's darker ones in silence. Hays coughed out a laughed and stowed his weapon, head shaking back and forth in quiet amusement. Wyatt calmed the smile and let his weight center onto one side of his body, drawing the pistol and letting it palm comfortably in his hand.

"Anything happen?"

"Naw." Jonah grinned, "Anything fun happen with you?"

He could feel his ears warming under his hat and used his free hand to tug it lower. "Shut up, Hays."

"Tell Jonesy all about it." The Tin Man cuffed him against the arm as he started to walk away, "On second thought…don't. The mental image is horrifying."

"S'cuse me?" Wyatt cocked his head back as Hays headed toward another tent.

"Poor girl." The brunette just shook his head as he sleepily ambled away muttering. "Probably hadda close her eyes grit her teeth just to get through it."

"Good night, Jonah." He said gently, remembering the promise he'd made.

"She's too pretty for you, Cain. Too sweet too." The older man threw a friendly hand back up as he tugged open the flap of the tent and eyed the inside before ducking into darkness.

Wyatt just shook his head and turned back out toward the trees, "That she is."

* * *

He tracked her moments after she'd left the safety of one of the central huts, a blanket wrapped warmly over her shoulders and her long dark hair loosened over it. The longer she lived away from the witch's control, the easier it was to see that she was DG's sister and Lavender's daughter. The three women were just similar enough in coloring and bone structure that it gave them away. And their voices…there was a tone that all three of them liked to use that rang the Gale bell in his head. It was a wonder that they still shared it considering how long they had lived apart.

"Princess." He nodded as Az stepped nearer to him, letting his glance sweep back out toward the trees. "You should be getting some rest. We still have a day's ride to Finaqua after the re-enforcements arrive."

"I can't sleep." She shook her head with a nervous smile, face lifting so that she could search the sky past the leaves. "What do you think Zero will do?"

"I think he'll wait until we're within a few miles of the maze and assume that we're feeling comfortable." Cain shrugged after he'd said it, "But then I never assumed he would come after you directly, either. At least not the way he did."

"He's losing balance." Azkadellia studied the stars a few moments before letting her jaw angle back down, a soft smile on her lips as she stepped closer for protective comfort. "He never was strong enough to contain his own brand of evil. He had to carry it out for others. Then guilt wasn't an issue."

"He was only doing what he was told." Cain nodded as he watched the leaves twitch in the chilled breeze.

"And now he's unstable." She agreed quietly. "Guilt may no longer be a factor."

He tucked his shoulders tight and clenched the muscles in his arms, feeling the cool weather start to seep past the cotton of his shirt sleeves. He rolled his shoulders and briefly smirked into the flush of heat that rose where DG had scraped her nails against skin. His breathing settled at the memory and when he looked to the side he caught the way Az was staring at him with a knowing, but amused, look on her face.

"Princess - "

"Az is fine." She interrupted, the smile growing wider on her lips. "In general you tend to use that title more as an… affectionate term."

Wyatt shook his eyes away from her with a reflexive grin. "How much do you know?"

"I surmised plenty but my sister isn't all that adept at blocking me from her emotions… especially when she's happy."

"So you - "

Az lifted a slim fingered hand between them, "On the contrary, Mr Cain, I know when to block her."

"Bless you."

She laughed between them and nodded, gazing back out toward the trees. "She'll learn quickly. She wasn't old enough when they sent her away."

He gazed back at the sadness that rounded out her voice. "You should take your mother's place, Az. When the time comes…You understand the Zone. You know these people. The history. You - "

"I won't leave her side but… I will always be the witch." Her eyes were dark but watery in the shadows. "Even the younger generations… They believe what they can see and what they see is a witch."

"I don't." he answered gently.

"Not always." Az allowed but then just stared at him, "But sometimes you do."

He opened his mouth to argue but she shook it off, "You flinch when she puts her hand in mine."

The token tone she'd used was familiar, utterly honest, and it paled him. "She's my priority."

"As she should be." Az forced a smile and nodded, tightening the blanket against her shoulders before turning to head back. "She's the next Queen."

"Az - "

"The emerald won't support a weak royal line, Mr Cain." Her voice was once again thick with the sound of her mother. "DG is its most logical choice. Besides… I'd rather have a life to live than a country to rule. Power tastes bitter when it rots."

He watched her step away from him with shoulders slackened, his voice following her softly, "Good night."

"Good night, Captain."

* * *

It did worry him a bit that she didn't wake when he entered the tent again. She should have been more aware, more tuned to her surroundings. She was still too trusting of the Zone and the way it played out around her. Still, it was a sighing comfort to watch her sleep, so still and easy. Wyatt let his head lean to the side, aiming to forget the weary way her father had taken over watch. His eyes followed the way she had tucked both arms up under her head, bare stomach pressed to the cot and hair flooding out reckless over her shoulders and arms. She'd drawn the duster up onto her rib cage but somehow kicked the blanket farther down to settle along her hips.

"DG." He caged his voice low, a subtle warning so that he didn't scare her as he stepped to the side of the cot. "C'mon, Princess."

"Stop waking me up." She muzzed the words out and rubbed her face into her arms as she stretched. "It's not allowed."

He smirked at her response, listening to the way her breathing started to settle back into an easy rhythm. One of his hands dropped down to tease at a curling wave of dark brown while the other undid his holster and vest. She made a pleased noise and turned her cheek against her arm, lidded eyes watching as he moved both hands to undress.

"Now that's allowed." She nodded sleepily. "Applauded even."

"Undressing?" he chuckled.

"Yes, please." She leaned onto her back and he blinked warm into the way her hair crested her shoulder and her breasts came into view.

"I shouldn't." he murmured as he dropped half his clothing and started undoing his belt. "Probably wouldn't be smart to run outta here with dangling bits if there's a firefight."

She laughed full into the words he'd laid over her as he leaned down. DG lifted both hands to catch against his jaw, scrubbing against the fuzz of stubble with long fingers. Her thumb rubbed his bottom lip and she let him kiss it before nipping his teeth against it. He tried to stand full again but stayed when she held him there, the other hand bracing the back of his neck.

"You're calmer than you were." She smiled and finally loosened her fingers.

"To be fair," Cain straightened and nudged off his boots. "There was a bit of excitement before I left."

DG nodded as he finished drawing off his clothes, drawing back the coverings so that he could slide against her. The chill that was radiating off his skin roughed against the warmth she'd finally found and she hissed against it, tightening him to her hips to warm him. Wyatt let her curl into his chest before laying his face into her hair, nervous as to the sudden comfort he found in the way she was pressed into him. The cynicism that still lived somewhere at the base of his brain told him that it wouldn't last past the gates of Finaqua.

DG made a noise of disagreement as he tightened up against her and cuddled farther into his chest, head lifting so that she could look over his face. She shook her head quietly and lifted a hand, fingertips tracing the scar on his eyebrow again. He was watching her with quiet interest and nervous caution.

"That's what I mean." She whispered, avoiding the bright blue of his eyes. "You shut me out."

"You can - "

"You lock everything up and I can't…" she shook her head. "I don't know how to explain it. But I know you're doing it."

"Sorry." He murmured as she looked over his face. "I can't help it."

DG just nodded in quiet acceptance, "You should get some sleep. You've been awake all night."

He watched her face go passively blank and squinted against it, letting his palm curve her hip to rub up her lower back. Fingernails scraped light and teasing along the arch of her spine and she sighed into it, breathing back in through her nose. He aimed both hands up to lay at the sides of her cheeks, palms flat against her face. Wyatt rolled her with a twist of his hips, using his knee to nudge her legs open before settling down between them. She accepted the slow and soft kiss he gave her before he let go and laid his head against her chest, breathing out slowly.

"You all right?" he asked quietly, trying to balance his weight over her.

Her fingers just rubbed at the back of his head in response, voice teasing at him. "Is this so that I can't leave without you knowing?"

He grinned and let his eyes slip closed without responding.

* * *

Ahamo stretched his legs out in front of him, wiping against blearily tired eyes with one hand while he sat against the log carved bench. His head lifted again and he listened silently, trying not to noticed how cold it had gotten in the night.

He let his thoughts angle on the man he'd just watched walk away, back to the tent that he could only assume his daughter was asleep in. There was no end to his frustration with the situation but even he had defended the former Tin Man when Lavender had started to mention separating the two of them. It wasn't that he disliked Cain. Truly, he didn't. And maybe he had grown too soft with emotion while alone to share her point of view but… he didn't feel the need to draw a line between the two of them.

It really wasn't his place.

Their daughter had grown into a young woman without them and now they had to deal with the repercussions of the choices they had made.

DG wasn't stupid and she wasn't weak.

He trusted her more than Lavender did…and maybe that was the other thing that DG had gotten from him.

Trust.

He woke to the way she was sliding her hands up and down against his biceps, fingers suddenly urgent and prodding.

"Can I tell you something?" he grumbled faked annoyance into her throat, his body still settled comfortable in the center of her heat.

"Hmm?" DG laid a smirk down over him and let one of her knees lift so that she could hook her calf around his hip.

Wyatt lifted his head and studied the please pink of her cheeks while she rubbed her fingers into the bare flexed muscles of his shoulders. He pressed his hands down beside her, testing the give of the cot before raising his body up, head bending to match the way she was watching him while her other leg hooked up against him.

"You're so wet." He whispered mischievously, eyes sparking clear-ice-blue and he drove his pelvis down against hers. "It's a damn sweet tease, Princess."

DG let her eyes flutter closed, a hand staying gripped against his shoulder while the other aimed between them. Cain caught her fingers with one palm, leaning his weight on the other arm while he drew her fingers up between her breasts. He shook his head, knowing she'd flicked her eyes back open at the way he'd stalled her.

"You - "

"Hush." He growled down over her, eyes slimming while he let go and wiped his hand down against her stomach. "Roll over."

DG flashed him a quick glance and he lowered his lips against hers to soften the gruff breathless quality of his voice. His tongue stroked hers before he pulled away, smiling into the way she was studying his face. He nodded and rubbed warm fingers against her stomach before pushing against her hip. DG rolled slowly onto her stomach, relaxing her arms under her chin as he started driving the heel of his palm warm into her lower back. His fingers followed in a smoother and softer pattern, the calloused skin stroking softness.

She groaned contented into the way he massaged against her back, his mouth already grazing over her shoulders and the back of her neck. Without thinking she shook her hair down so that he had more skin to cover with kisses as his hand sloped down and teased against the backs of her thighs. Wyatt smirked when he saw her bite her bottom lip, head turned to the side and eyes shut. He buried his face in her hair and sucked down the scent of violets, letting it lull him while he teased his fingers into wetness. DG bit down against her lip, hips lifting as he angled his palm up under her for more control.

"Hush." He prodded the word into the back of her head and she realized that she'd been moaning into the thrust and draw of his fingers. "Your father is ten feet away."

She smirked her flushed face down into her arms and let him pull her hips higher, the heat he'd been sharing with her leaving when he shifted behind her and laid out over her lower body. Both his hands settled him low against her and she felt damp fingers push her legs open further, smiling into the way he was already hardening as he slid his length against wetness.

"Don't tease me, Wyatt." The demanding tone in her voice as she angled her head back made him growl and he rubbed his shaft against slickness but didn't slide into her.

DG whimpered, driving her hips back against his hands. "Wyatt."

Cain nodded a smirk and spread up over her back, his weight balancing on one arm while he used the other hand to work himself harder. He let his face into her hair again, nose rubbing through it while he lined himself to her and pushed as slowly as his hips allowed. She moaned louder than he expected and he laughed a shushing noise into the back of her neck.

He angled his jaw against the crook of her neck, trying to level his breathing as he started slow and shallow thrusts into her. DG angled her hips, pressing up with her knees a bit as his hand sloped under her. It passed her stomach and then curved between her thighs so that he could tease against her clit. She dropped a hand to rub his forearm while he worked her, his hips jutting faster in a slowly building rhythm.

"Quietly." He murmured against the shell of her ear. "Quietly, love."

He kept a slow rhythm with his hips but sped his fingers, drawing her tighter against him with a flex of his arm. His mouth laid against her neck, testing her skin with his tongue before sucking against it. Higher than the mark he'd left before, but just as possessive. Wyatt breathed steadily through his nose, nipping at her skin as he sped his fingers more. He heard the way she tried to cut her moaning quiet into her arm and he paused a moment, shifting the arm that held him against her up a bit higher. His mouth left her skin and he rubbed his nose against the side of her head.

"You first, Princess." The smile that breathed alive in his voice flushed her more and she couldn't help the volume of the moan she gave up as he pinched her clit.

DG drove her face down hard, biting against her wrist as his hips started getting faster, his fingers roughing against her. She felt the way he curled tighter around her as she started to shiver back into him, clenching against his length. He drove his face down the line of her spine and kissed her skin, his fingers finally drawing a surprising orgasm off her. Wyatt smiled into her skin when he heard the whimper she dropped against her skin, hips bucking back against him as she came and he slowed his fingers. He kept them pressing her clit, feeling it throb while he jacked his thrusts harder. Head lifted, he buried his face into dark waves of hair and groaned her name. She was pulsing and clenching around him and the sudden flood of wetness around his length was hot and the feeling of it hit him straight in the gut.

"Please?"

The way she whispered it from beneath him had him shutting his eyes against a flare of hot white and he shuddered his hips into her, coming hard as he breathed open mouthed and ragged into her hair. He'd forgotten the warning of quiet and groaned low and loud against the back of her neck.

"Can I tell you something else?" he whispered breathlessly against her shoulder blade, his hand soothing on her hip as he pressed both their bodies slow into the cot.

She made a sated noise of agreement and spread flat.

Wyatt smirked against her back, "I'm pretty sure he may have heard that anyhow."

The way she shrugged and snuggled back against the way he was leaning more to the side just made him grin proudly.

* * *

He'd left her more than half an hour before, already dressed and his usually pretty eyes looking a bit bloodshot in the reddening light of morning. DG studied the shirt she'd pulled on, frowning at the grimed color that had once been white.

"Take it off."

Her sister's voice had been a surprise and she jumped at the solid tone of it, drawing Az to laugh over her. DG looked over the way she was holding another shirt, this one darker and smaller, laces up the front that made her cock a disbelieving glance at her sister. She arched a brow and took it quietly, looking it over.

"It's not going to hurt you to wear something that shows you're actually a woman." Az chided softly. "Be thankful that I didn't bring you a skirt."

"I'll wear a skirt when I have to." DG murmured and drew the other shirt off easily, turning to lay it against cot so that she could pull the other one on.

"That may be sooner than you think." Azkadellia moved in and softly pulled her hair back as she started lacing the black fabric up the front of her body. "Hello, there…"

DG tipped her head back and realized the older woman was smirking at the reddened rush that lined the side of her neck. She lifted a hand against them and couldn't save herself from smiling at the heat that radiated off them as she rubbed soothing against the marks he'd left over normally pale skin. Az arched an eyebrow and stepped back, motioning for her sister to turn. She rolled her eyes in feigned frustration and reached forward, tightening the laces harder from the bottom up. She tied them tightly at the top, nodding when DG put her hands to her flared hips.

"You've got to be kidding me."

Az just shook her head as she looked over the younger woman. "He won't walk straight for a good ten minutes, fair bet."

"We have bigger things to worry about, Az."

The older of the two just shrugged and pushed her little sister's tight sleeves half up her arms , "Enjoy it, Deeg. It's your life. It's happening. So enjoy it."

DG gave her a wide open glance, "We'll make it to Finaqua, right?"

Az just gave her a smiling nod, "Of course. Zero can't hurt you."

She watched the way the words she repeated from her mother soothed the younger of the two and offered her hand in silence. DG took it easily and breathed in at the thrum that tingled up her wrist. Az gave her fingers a squeeze and tugged at her, pulling her toward the open doorway of the tent.

"Mother and father are already discussing strategy with the others." She said gently, drawing DG behind her. "I told them that I would come wake you."

"No word from Jeb's men?"

"Not yet." Az shook her head back sadly. "I think Cain's going to have someone backtrack."

"He doesn't really trust anyone enough to do it." DG sighed softly.

"Then I guess he'll have to learn to trust fairly quickly."

There was no arguing with the flattened way she'd laid out the statement between them.

* * *

"I'll do it." Ahamo leaned forward, shrugging into the words. "I can get out there and back in half a day."

"You will not." Lavender argued with sudden force, eyes roving over his face. "You're exhausted."

"Everyone is exhausted." He breathed out, avoiding the tired lines of the faces that surrounded him. "I'm the best choice."

"Unless I go." Wyatt said quietly. "Or send Jonah."

"You don't trust Jonah." DG leaned into the conversation, reaching for some of the fruit that one of the Viewers had offered them. "What about Glitch?"

He ignored the cocky tone of her voice and held a look with the other man, noticing the way Ahamo glanced darkly between the two of them. The older man caught his eyes and he nodded. They made the silent agreement without consulting with the women that surrounded them and he knew he'd probably pay for it later. Ahamo was already rising from his seat on the bench and waving over one of the Viewers, heading toward her in silence.

"He shouldn't be going alone." Lavender hushed to the former Tin Man. "He shouldn't be going at all."

Wyatt nodded with a sigh, "DG? Wanna ask Glitch if he'll go with your father?"

She cocked him a glance as she chewed on the fruit and nodded, "Sure."

He looked up slowly to thank her and the hard swallow he made when he studied the way the shirt hugged from her hips to her breasts was just thanks enough.


	12. Chapter 12

"Well, I'll be goddamned."

The muttered praise from the other man stalled the jaunty tirade Glitch had been rattling off and he looked up abruptly, noting the way Ahamo had jerked his horse to a sudden stop. He looked in the same direction and felt a smile inch his lips as he blocked the flare of double suns from his vision, focusing past the searing brightness to watch a small contingent cross the valley a good hour's walk away from them.

"It's true."

"It's more than true." Ahamo murmured gently, "That's at least… forty men."

"Forty isn't an army." Glitch spoke in a gently concerned tone.

"It's a well made militia, though." The Consort answered back and dug his heels down, spurring the horse into a hard gallop toward the men. "Good enough for now."

Glitch started to follow him but the older man once again halted his horse, turning him at a quick angle. "Go back and tell Cain. Get them ready."

"Consort, you shouldn't be alone."

"It's a short ride for me." Ahamo waved him off, "Go. We're going home, Ambrose."

He didn't correct the Royal, head just tipping at an angle before he turned his horse and headed back to camp.

* * *

"Damn it."

The hand-made piece of pottery that was sitting before her cracked in a feathering line down the middle and DG dropped her face into her hands, head pounding and the blood rushing a thump-a-thump roar in her ears. She felt her sister's hand against her shoulder in silent support and just breathed in hard through her nose before sitting up again. Her fingers rubbed at her temples.

"I can't move it but I can break it." She waved a tired hand toward the now useless water jug.

"Mend the pieces." Tutor's interjecting voice was really starting to annoy her.

It was the lulled quiet admonition that laced every word.

It was the lesson he laid into every sentence.

It was driving her up a damn wall.

"You know - "

"Deeg." Azkadellia's fingers tugged at her hair in warning and she sucked down another breath. "Focus."

"My head is killing me." She murmured quietly and looked back to the cracked jug.

"Use it." Her sister bent down beside her, her long fingered hand still flexed against DG's shoulder tightly. "Use the pain."

She closed her eyes, trying to close in the flaring color of hurt behind her eyes, concentrating on the loud ebb and wave of her blood pumping. Blue eyes opened and she felt a thrum from where her sister was pressing down against her shoulder, her breathing going subtle and even and comfortable as she watched the fissure in the jug slowly seal itself from the bottom. She squinted, closing down on the pain and pushing it out of her body. The rush of expelling it exploded the jar into shards and both women ducked their faces away from the way it shattered in their direction.

"Well done." Tutor was smiling widely, his teeth white against dark skin.

"I broke it again." DG waved at the scattered pieces in clear frustration.

"But you fixed it in between." Az kissed the side of her head. "That's progress."

"Maybe for a demolition crew." The muttered quietly but smiled when Az kissed her again just out of pure affection.

"Don't give up, Princess." Their teacher prodded as he leaned down and started picking up the pieces. "Azkadellia's right."

"I usually am." The older of the two smirked and tweaked DG's hair. "Hungry?"

"Starving."

Az just reached for her hand, "Me too."

* * *

He watched her quietly, studying the smile that perked her lips as she spoke with her sister. They were too far away for him to hear anything but he didn't mind being out the loop. He rather enjoyed watched the way she just munched on a handful of something while the two of them chattered away. Her body was perched on an outcropping of rocks near the water and Azkadellia was only a bit lower, her eyes cast out over the sway of the tide. DG said something that made the older woman laugh and he smiled at the seemingly perfect beauty of the two of them laughing together.

Wyatt jumped slightly when he heard steps behind him, the palm of his right hand edging the butt of his pistol as he turned. He settled out a breath as he saw the Queen lean toward him, ducking branches so that she could quietly move in beside him. There was an awkward smile layered on her lips and she didn't speak. Cain just watched the inquisitive way she looked over her daughters.

"They are the balance between them." She spoke very quietly and he had to strain to hear her.

"I wouldn't get in their way." He responded and nodded when Lavender lifted hushing fingers to her smiling lips, a step closer to his side.

"Before the witch… I couldn't control them when they were in agreement." She murmured very gently, shaking her head as she reminisced. "They were always a combined front. How do you fight that?"

Cain just huffed out a half laugh, "I can rarely keep up with DG on her own."

"I'd noticed." The arch and dry tone of the Queen's voice suddenly reminded him that they weren't just two people sharing a comfortable conversation in uncomfortable times.

She was the Queen of the Outer Zone.

He was a servant to her family.

She was exceptional at silently reminding him of his place.

Wyatt took a slow breath and turned his head back, "It's not my intention to displease you but…"

"But?"

He turned a blank stare at the woman, seeing the conflicting emotions in her eyes a moment before they turned a stone gray color of resolve, "I have my priorities, your Majesty."

He turned his head so that he could watch her laughing with her sister, "And she's higher on that list than you are."

The reaction of the mother was seething quieter than the reaction of the sister.

At that moment, he didn't much care.

Except... the Tin Man in him did.

* * *

He joined them gently, taking care to make his steps toward the sisters slow and easily announced. Az sighted him first, her jaw lifting as she laughed. Her hand waved him forward and he was suddenly far more comfortable than he had been since leaving DG sprawled naked under his duster, breathing slow and muttering in her sleep. Wyatt leaned down, nearly blushing into the way the older woman watched as he tucked a kiss against the younger woman's neck.

DG lifted her hand against his cheek to keep him still, angling her jaw so that she could hear his uneven breathing. Her fingers dug against his cheek lightly and she could feel a tremor in him that seemed suddenly unnerving. Her blue eyes widened with worry and she turned her jaw to his.

"You're shaking." She said gently, palm still cupping his face.

"I'm fine."

She turned her upper body quickly, head turned back to look behind him. "What happened?"

Cain just shrugged his shoulders and crouched beside her, catching the questioning way Azkadellia was glancing between him and the line of trees that he had come from. DG was focused on him again, ignoring the way he was trying to shy away from her fingers so that she could lift his face to hers, forcing the nearly white-bright of his blues to meet the darker hue of hers.

"Wyatt." It wasn't a question this time. It was an order.

"What did she say to you, Captain?" Az was already standing, her spine straight and tight as she forgot the food they'd been picking over.

He huffed up and breathless and sardonic laugh, "It's just not every day you tell your Queen that you don't give a damn about her safety."

"That's not true." DG murmured, scrutinizing the darkening look on his face. "You don't believe that any more than either of us do."

He let all emotion blank from his features, "I told her that she isn't my priority."

Az nodded once and let her hand brush warmly on his shoulder as she stepped by him slowly, "As you should have done. I'll take care of it."

"No." DG spoke rapidly but her eyes were solidly focused on the uncomfortable look that was still fixed pinching on his face. "Az, forget it."

"She has no right - "

"Azkadellia." DG just shook her head and forced a smile over her face as she rubbed a finger on Cain's bottom lip, "Let it go."

"DG." The older woman laid a protective glanced over her. "Are you sure?"

"If she has a problem." The small framed brunette nodded, still watching his face with stern sincerity. "She can come to me. I'll take care of it."

* * *

"It's the emerald." She offered up quietly, leaning her hands back against the banked grass in a way that laid out her body far too deliciously. "The sounds, the headache."

"Your proximity to it?" he questioned gently, letting his legs stretch out as he mimicked a similar posture.

DG nodded thoughtfully, "Az can hear it too. Feel it."

Cain plucked at the grass between them with idle fingers, still keeping half glances turned around them sporadically, "It's not going to be easy."

"None of it is going to be easy." She cocked her head to the side, a weak smile on her lips trying to balance the void in her voice. "Except the getting you naked part."

Wyatt tossed off a chuckle and threw a handful of grass at her, breathing gently as he slowly looked up at her amused face, "I mean the three of you constantly being together. Your power, strength."

"Not for long." She shook her head and her glance surveyed the water that was stretched out before them.

He leaned onto one elbow as she quieted, confusion thinning his lips. Cain tipped out his free palm and closed it against her calf, drawing her attention so that she was looking quietly down at him. He shook his head in questioning confusion and watched as she blinked a glance back toward the water.

"Az seems to think that there's been a shift." She murmured. "Both in the Zone and between us. I…I think I agree with her."

He dropped his hand to the grass, eyes shutting while he waited for the words she was debating in her head, "Start with the latter, please?"

"We… I don't think that mother is as strong as she was." DG felt how awkward the words tipped off her tongue and wrestled with the rest of them. "She's…drained."

"She was drained long before now." He leaned farther onto his side, studying the curve of her stomach and the lacing that ran up under her breasts.

"This is different." She explained quietly. "She's losing whatever she had left and I think it's our fault."

"The two of you together?" he asked and she nodded quickly.

"The three of us together with the emerald." She responded and turned a nervous glance down over him. "It's forcing a change. The balance of power is shifting."

"And what else?" he reached the backs of his knuckles against her hip to comfort the worry that was rising in her tone.

"There's something bigger than Zero out there." She murmured quietly, clouding her voice in nervous softness. "He won't be the biggest fight."

Cain turned his head up over the pale of her face, "Why didn't you tell me this sooner?"

"I wasn't sure." The jittery apology that was written over her face was enough to weaken the way he wanted to be angry with her. "Not until Az - "

"No more secrets." He leaned back onto his hands, pushing himself up so that he could brace his forearms against drawn knees. "All right?"

"I didn't - "

"Don't hide things from me." His eyes sliced clear bright as he turned his head toward her sharply, "Understand?"

DG just let her jaw lift and clench as she quietly looked back over the water. "What did you give her every birthday?"

Wyatt closed his eyes and breathed out through pursed lips. "Corsin Lake, every spring… There are lilies that grow on the shoreline. Only live a few days. She always said they reminded her of my eyes."

Her hand was soft against the side of his head and while at first he wanted to tighten against the touch, he turned his jaw into the curve of her palm and kissed against her fingers. His eyes opened when she lifted up at his jaw.

DG gave him a tired smile, "No more secrets, Tin Man. I promise."

"How bad is it?" he asked and caught her fingers.

"I don't know." She shook her head. "Not yet."

* * *

"He's talkin' gibberish in between but from what I can grasp - "

"Jonah." Cain slammed a dry glance toward the other man, impatience rasping his tone and he offered DG a firm hand to stand. "Cut to it."

"Around forty men on foot." The older man exhaled hard, his face a blotchy mix of pale and ruddy red. "The Consort rode on to meet them and the Zipperhead came back."

"His name is Glitch." DG corrected in a cocky tone that made him smirk in pride.

Wyatt nodded and felt the smile that crowded his lips as he looked over the water and then down at the way DG was wiping grass off her pants. He licked his lips and looked back excitedly toward the other man, catching the way Jonah was staring back at them. The older man shrugged and lifted both his hands in a questioning way.

"Orders, Captain?"

Wyatt bent and snatched his hat up off the ground, tugging it down on his head, "I want you making sure everyone who's going with us is packed up and ready. Send Jeb's scouts back to Central City with enough food and water. Tell them that we're moving before the end of the day."

"Raw." She tugged at his sleeve insistently. "We need to see if Raw is coming with us."

He just nodded down at her, knowing that it was a decision that she may not like the end result of if Raw stayed behind. "Go. I'll find your sister and your mother."

She arched a brow at mention of her mother, "Don't start anything."

He tucked a finger to his lips, "Not a word, Princess. Go on."

"This is exciting." Jonah grinned at him, hands set to his hips.

Cain just snorted a laugh and waved toward the encampment, eyes following the way she'd already ducked off in search of the Viewer. "Let's go."

* * *

"Can't go yet." There was a pure look of sorrowed regret on the Viewer's face, his body curling slightly inward in apprehension.

DG smiled into the nervous way he spoke and lifted a hand against his arm. "I understand."

"Bring Kalm when Finaqua is safe." He nodded to her and reached a hand up to catch her fingers.

She curled their hands together and leaned in, letting her forehead break warm against his so that they were leaning comfortably into each other. After a moment she laughed into the movement and broke a hug against him, enjoying the few moments of comfort between them while he hugged tightly back. Her hand wiped back his hair lightly as she leaned far enough to look over his face.

"I hate it when my hug invitation gets lost." Glitch's voice was a quiet interruption and DG let off another laugh as he stepped up toward them. "Cain wants you readied with your sister."

"It's temporary." She poked a finger into the Viewer's chest playfully. "We'll see you soon."

Raw nodded a strong smile and pulled up her hand, kissing it softly, "See you soon, DG."

She let Glitch tuck a quick hug against the Viewer's side before offering her his arm. "Shall we, Princess?"

DG just rolled her eyes and hugged onto his arm, letting him walk her away.

* * *

"Shouldn't we let them rest?"

"We will." Wyatt slacked the reigns around his palm and turned the Pinto. "Get on the horse."

"I mean before we leave." She argued and while he was all tensed up muscle and jittered nerves, the fact she very nearly stamped her foot when she argued with him brought a half smile to his lips.

"Get on the horse." He repeated quietly, angling his hips to block her against the animal's side, her palm broaching Jefferson's neck.

"Don't." she brooded her eyes dark as they slimmed. "Don't use that sexy growly manly tone with me right now."

"You usually like that tone." He dropped the reigns and put both his hands against her hips.

"Right now it's annoying." She pushed the other hand flat to his chest to keep him from pressing farther forward. "I'm gonna punch you."

Wyatt angled his head low to meet her eyes, voice hushing. "Get on the horse, baby. Please?"

"I happen to know for a fact that you have a broader vocabulary than that." She grudgingly reached for the reigns and turned her hips, letting him lift as she stepped up into the saddle.

His hand slid against her thigh and held there while he steadied the excited animal. Wyatt let the other palm pass slow against the horse's neck, rubbing softly as he let off a hushing noise. The fingers he'd left against her thigh were tight pressed and slowly rubbed comfort into her leg as well.

"I'm going out with your mother to meet your father." He spoke slowly and gently. "You and Az wait until I clear you, okay?"

"Those men need to rest." She admonished and looped up the excess length of the reigns, resettling her body on the saddle. "You know that, Wyatt."

"We'll stop once we've safely cleared the encampment a bit." He nodded, "They'll be fine. They know it's a long haul."

He let his hand slip off her leg and refused himself a glance up at her face. Forcing himself to turn he tried to move away from her without catching the glint of her blue eyes. And he should have known, before he even tried, that it wouldn't have worked. He should have known... He tried to move away from her anyhow, knowing that there were plenty of people bustling by that would catch the marginal fear that might be visible in his eyes. Including both her sister and her mother.

He didn't want to give up protecting her.

But to protect her he had to.

And that scared him.

"Captain Cain." Her voice was low, controlled, and it slid down his spine to pool heat straight in his groin. "Come back here."

His shoulders slackened and he let his head drop back against his shoulders. "Princess…"

"Come here." She repeated in a hushed tone that he doubted anyone else could hear.

Wyatt turned and stepped straight back into the side of the horse, refusing to lift his head so that she could see his eyes past the brim of his hat. At least not until he'd angled his chest against the turn of her calf. He gave in and quietly let his head press down against her leg, the smooth run of her fingers on the back of his neck a warm but temporary comfort.

He looked up with a half a smile. "Do what I tell you."

"Stop ordering me around." She was trying to smile back at him in a teasing manner but it was faltering and fading.

"I'll be fine." One of his hands caught her forearm and tugged, the other bracing her back to balance her while he pulled down against her. "Hear me?"

DG nodded with a blushing smile and leaned into the way he was pulling at her, thin fingers tweaking up his hat playfully before she locked a kiss on him that had him clutching her arm against his chest and sucking hard against her tongue. He groaned into the way both her hands held his face tight against hers as she sucked and nipped against his bottom lip. She pulled from the kiss slowly and he watched her kiss his eyebrow before straightening and picking the reigns back up.

"Follow through, Tin Man." She nodded at him and then backed the Pinto up slowly, knowing she'd flushed his ears a pink that they'd rarely seen in the light of day.

"DG." He caught the way her mother and sister were silently waiting not five feet away, eyes roving back to her.

"I mean it." She spoke strong but quiet. "You hear me?"

He just smiled and tugged the hat back down on his forehead, "Yes, Princess. I do."


	13. Chapter 13

"To be entirely honest," Ahamo settled back in the saddle, catching the way his wife looked at him with a sidelong glance. "I just don't have the energy to fight with her about it."

"I think she has more important things to focus on right now and that - "

"I don't think we have any say in what she should or should not focus on." He hushed the words out and angled his horse closer to hers, angling a glance back to the train of men and horses and wagon that laid out behind them. "Honestly, dear… She's a grown woman. She's made a choice. And this sort of choice is none of our business. If she was sixteen, it would be different but she's not. We missed that chance. It's gone."

Lavender breathed out in mild frustration and looked forward, riding a few moments in silence. She let her eyes slip closed, one hand stretching out to her right and catching his arm so that he grasped her reigns and led her horse without a word. Ahamo looked over her face, noting the quiet acceptance and slowly passing peace she was making with herself and the words he'd shared. His fist wound the reigns to her horse tighter around his palm and he kept an even speed between the horses.

"Lavender…" he breathed out, watching the way Cain was steadily riding ahead of them, two other men flanking him on mounts that the Viewers had provided. "She could have made a far worse choice. I respect him."

"I respect him." She agreed and nodded marginally. "And I can't say that I trust another man more than him for the position he is in. It's not him that I have a problem with."

Ahamo turned his head and offered his wife a gentling smile, "It's the fact that she's not sixteen and we don't have anything to say?"

"We missed too much." Her eyes roved away from him and he saw a layer of ashen sadness on her skin. "We missed all of it."

"Not all of it." He murmured. "Just enough to make it hurt."

* * *

"You look beautiful."

DG abruptly shot her sister a questioning glance, eyes roving over Azkadellia's face as though she was waiting for the punch line of a joke. Her back straightened from the unknowing slump she'd taken on and she looked farther up ahead to her parents and then back. Her hands both flexed at Jefferson's reigns before she cocked her head back to the older woman.

"Thank you?" she said awkwardly. "Did I just miss something?"

Az just shook her head and let out a teasing laugh, "You were such an awkward child."

"Did you just call me ugly?" DG reached a slap out to her sister's leg. "That's cruel."

"I did not." Az lifted her chin with a smirk. "You weren't ugly. Just… awkward."

"I can't believe you." The younger of the two shook her head, a half smile lilting her lips as she looked past the way her parents were deep in conversation to find Cain at the lead of the long parade of men.

Her eyes tripped over his shoulders and the way he was turning orders off to the man at his left. The strong line of his broad shoulders made the smile that was tipping her lips a bit wider and she let a sighed breath go. When she glanced back at her sister, Az was mischievously smirking.

"What?"

"You look lovely." Az shrugged and just held a dazzling smile in her direction. "I just… wanted to say so."

"You were always prettier than me." DG rolled her eyes. "Don't start."

"It's not a matter of being 'pretty', Dorothy."

It was the first time she recalled Az using her full name in a very, very long time.

It made her stare hard at her sister.

"I don't understand - "

"I like that he makes you smile." Az shrugged again and her face went slack. "It's been a very long time since I've seen you smile and…"

"And?" DG prodded.

"I've never seen you smile like this." Her older sister shook her head as she tried to explain, "I remember an awkward little girl, always getting into trouble."

DG breathed a laugh out through her nose, "I'm still getting into trouble."

"Well, I don't think you'll ever outgrow that."

* * *

He let the horse slow into a gentle and casual gait, eyes searching through the crowd of men that were sitting or laying back against the grass. He was passing them as many supportive smiles as he could muster, nodding to the faces that he recognized, answering greetings from some. Still, he was searching past their faces for a pair of blue eyes and a riot of dark waves of hair. Wyatt felt himself losing the smiles and patience that supplied them, having already searched for her for too long to be comfortable.

"Glitch." He whistled loudly toward the other man, halting the horse while he waved the advisor toward him.

He aimed down off the mare and wiped at the sweat that had layered over her. She needed rest but he didn't feel comfortable unsaddling her. Cain lifted the reigns and rubbed against her shoulders, making a hushed soothing noise over her while Glitch moved up beside him.

"How long are we staying here?" the other man asked quietly, leaning into the Tin Man's side. "It's awfully open."

"I know." Wyatt nodded with a weak smile. "We'll move soon. Just a rest stop."

"DG's at the back line." Glitch smirked at him, already guessing at the other man's questioning glance.

Cain just smiled his thanks, "Azkadellia?"

"She's with her parents by the wagon." Glitch murmured. "By the wagon."

"Okay." He nodded into the nervous repetition, sucking in a piece of patience as he lifted the reigns, "Can you make sure she gets some water? Let her graze a little?"

The younger man just nodded kindly and took the reigns, tipping his head toward the last of the men with a knowing smile.

* * *

He stepped up behind them quietly, watching the way she kept a hand up under the cup as the young man drank gulping from a dinged metal cup. Cain passed a hand against his revolver just out of habit, not knowing how to enter between the two of them. He watched as DG murmured something quietly and pulled the cup away, his eyes on the slumped form of the young kid she was crouched beside. It was a brief moment before she looked up and instead of the smile he expected, she aimed a worried and conflicted look at him. The sudden flush of anger that rushed her face confused him and he moved to step around the young man but she stood quickly and stepped into him.

"We need to talk." Her hand looped his bicep and Wyatt let her pull him a few steps away, confused when she tugged him around so that he couldn't look to the man.

"What's gotten into you?" he dropped his voice low, tugging the hat down as he bent into the way she'd leaned her side into his chest. "I know he's young, Princess but we've discussed this. I can't - "

"He's a 'she'." She hissed the words up at him. "She snuck in and she's been hanging back here so that no one notices."

Wyatt arched a brow and looked over his shoulder, catching the way she girl was glancing back at him over her shoulder. She'd done well enough from far away… hair cut short and tucked back under a hat. Her small lanky body passing for a young man's in gritty and grubby clothing. The only thing that gave her away from a distance was the slender slide of her hand as she rubbed her face, fingers long and thin and reminding him of DG's. Cain rolled his eyes away from the girl and glanced back forward toward where the other men were chatting quietly while they rested and picked at rations.

"She's exhausted but she won't let me put her on a horse." DG murmured.

"The only way I got you on a horse was to put you there myself." He countered cockily and rubbed his fingers against the bridge of his nose.

"I remember." She squinted at him and let her shoulder lean comfortably into his chest.

He angled his head down, still pushing at the headache that was coloring behind his eyes. Sucking down the warm and welcome smell of her, he took another breath to calm himself. His teeth nipped at the inside of his cheek while he tried to figure out what to do, head shaking slowly back and forth.

"Why?" he asked quietly, "Why'd she come?"

"Finaqua." DG answered quietly. "Finaqua is…"

"Safety." He interrupted with a nod. "It's freedom."

"Exactly." She agreed, looking worried as she glanced back to the young woman. "What do we do with her?"

He just shook his head, "Take her to the front if it makes you feel better but let her walk. She wants to walk it. She wanted to come… let her."

"We don't know if she's trained or if - "

"DG." He couldn't help but smile as he hushed her. "Listen to yourself."

"What?" she glanced up at him sharply. "Because I'm worried about her? She's - "

"She's just like you." He teased and tapped the tip of her nose. "Stubborn."

Her shoulders lifted in a mix of offended pride and the confusion of it rendered her quiet a moment before she sucked down a breath and leaned into him, "You like that I'm stubborn."

Cain tipped his head at an angle, mouth leaning into her ear, "I do, Princess. Especially when you're trying not to blush because you know that I know how you taste."

Her eyes narrowed at him. "You're a bastard."

Wyatt just grinned and watched the pink flush her throat, his fingers running a brief line down the lacing of her shirt before he walked away. "Get her to the front."

* * *

He saw it as he walked his way back toward the front line. A tall shadow of a man that stood before the flare of sunlight that blackened it. His jaw instantly tensed and his steps turned faster, hand clenching against his weapon while his boots bent into a half run toward the front of the line. He caught the way Azkadellia was suddenly watching him and tried not to let on. He saw her head turn forward, a hand crowding the sun away from her eyes as she looked forward and saw the silhouette as well.

Wyatt ran faster, bending into a quick jog that got him close to her as her shoulders squared and hardened. He could see the torque and tension in her spine from feet away as he got closer.

"I'm going." He murmured and caught her elbow as softly as he could. "Don't let on to DG that - "

"You are not." She slowly pried her elbow from his fingers, lifting her arm in a graceful arch while she stared back over him.

Wyatt was jarred by the cool and calm derision that laced her voice and fell pale over her face. The joy and calm generosity that had ceaselessly surprised him since the death of the witch was suddenly vacant and the fury that brightened her hazel eyes threw him nervous. Cain shifted back on his heels, palm rounding the butt of the revolver as he studied the certainty that stone-set her face.

"I'm going." She said gently. "And so is Dorothy."

"Princess - "

"This is finished." She interrupted him, voice slicing hard between them.

The hard glance he was giving in return was enough to soften her face and force her to lean into him, "Captain… I need her with me for this."

"I'm going." He turned his glance back up, noting that the man had neither moved closer nor farther away. "I'm not leaving the two of you up there alone."

Az just ruefully smiled, "I didn't really expect any different."

* * *

"Thank you." The girl softly smiled up at her, speaking around the food that she was unceremoniously stuffing into her mouth. "I'm starving."

DG just nodded and slowed her steps so that she could watch the younger woman try to awkwardly walk and eat at the same time. Her hand was loose at the blonde's elbow, aiming her toward where the front line of men was lounging on the now hard packed and treaded ground.

She opened her mouth to say something to the young woman but stalled when she saw Cain heading toward her, his face a dark sheen of something worrisome. He was heading straight for her, body tight and lined taut in a way that she normally would have enjoyed watching sidle toward her but… the winced crowding of his eyes and the set of his jaw…

"Princess." He opened his hand freely before her, knowing she would reach her fingers into his. "I need you to come with me. Now."

DG considered arguing but the fervor and pleading that mixed in the bright clear hue of his eyes hushed the thought. Her fingers curled against his and she felt the way he pulled her arm tight across his body, aiming her instantly toward where her sister and mother were already waiting yards ahead.

"What's going on?"

He lifted her fingers and kissed them at the bent knuckles, holding her hand there while he switched hands and put the warmed one to her back. His face was blank and staring ahead, eyes slimming as he considered how to tell her…

"Az needs you." He finally cocked his head to the side. "Look ahead."

"Az is fine, Wyatt."

"Farther ahead."

DG looked past her sister, farther up on the ridgeline that spread out before them. She saw the shadow that she could only assume was Zero, waiting for them. Her hand closed tighter on his and he warmed her chilled fingers against his bottom lip. His other hand spread harder against her lower back, thumb rubbing up the line of her spine. DG pushed her shoulders back and let her head lift up so that she could look over the stolid pass of his face. He was wearing the world again, a map on the features of his face.

"Hey." She forced an uncertain smile into her whisper. "It's show time, Tin Man."

"I'm not leaving your side." He cocked the words down over her, allowing no argument to the stern quality of his tone. "Don't get foolishly heroic on me, Princess."

She winked at him, trying to be playful to counterbalance the way nerves were jittering from his forearm to his fingers. "That's what all the consorts say."

"Stop it." His jaw flexed and he bit back on a smirk, slowing their steps as they neared her sister. "You're not funny."

"I am." She nodded and refused to let go of his fingers, tightening her palm against his as he angled against her back to stay close. "You just have a crappy sense of humor when you're stressed."

"I'm not stressed." He mumbled against the back of her head and she just shrugged as Azkadellia gave her a dark glance. "I'm focused."

"Potato." She mumbled. "Tomato."

"You see him?" Az fumed in a hushed tone. "He's taunting us."

"I see him." DG rolled an equally dark glance to where Zero was lazily waiting. "Ever a fan of the dramatics."

"Mother can't do this." Az lowered her voice farther. "Deeg?"

DG just plastered a fake smile on, tightening her fingers against his while the other opened in front of her sister, "Take my hand, Az."

Azkadellia turned a true smile to the younger woman and placed their palms together, "I won't let go."

* * *

He nearly tripped as he clattered down the stairs, his wrist twisting as he jerked a tight hold to keep himself from tumbling down stone. Jeb stalled and forced himself to calm a bit, evening his breathing before taking the steps quick but easy. His booted feet were heavy, weighted and tired. His eyes were stinging at him and he could see that the two men that were waiting for him were twice as ragged as he was.

His hand stretched out to the nearest one as he broke to the even flooring, "They made it?"

One of his resistance fighters nodded, an unintended smile breaking his grimy face as he let his shoulders slump, "They're moving. All of them. Heading for Finaqua."

Jeb squeezed at the man's shoulder with a grin, "Good. Good. My father?"

"Still a crotchety old man."

Jeb just smiled wider and nodded into a breathy laugh, "Excellent."

* * *

"Don't leave their sides." Wyatt bunched his fingers on the hem of the other man's jacket, drawing Glitch closer with a forceful tug and turn of his wrist. "Get me, Zip?"

"I get it." The former advisor's face had darkened considerably and his normal genial smile was faded dark. "Why isn't the Queen - "

"She stays here." Wyatt's voice hissed low as he leaned into the dark haired man, forcing to calm his tone as he noted Glitch's stare, "Okay? Make sure she stays here and she's protected. I'm sending Jonah and Tutor over to guard her too."

"I get it." Glitch sniffed at him defensively. "I won't leave her."

"I know you won't." Wyatt just patted lightly at the younger man's cheek and smiled in honest friendly affection. "Thank you."

* * *

"Captain Cain."

His feet instantly stopped moving but he swept his eyes closed against turning, hoping that something would interrupt the way her voice was ringing over him. He knew after a breathless beat of silence, that nothing was coming to save him from having an uncomfortable conversation with the Queen of the Outer Zone. Cain shifted and weighted his body into a right turn, tightening his shoulders back to prepare himself for…he wasn't sure what. He expected fury on her face, he expected anger or a certain calculated coldness that she'd had to wear enough times before…

He found that her face was soft and weary with worry. Or fear.

"Your Majesty." He dipped his head.

"I do trust you, you know?" she said gently and he caught the way her Consort was moving up quietly to her shoulder, his hand bracing comfortingly against her.

"Yes, ma'am." He let his head dip again in acquiescence.

Lavender stepped easily away from her husband and neared him with slow and patient steps. She let out a hand and caught against his wrist, pulling his hand up as they shared a glance. He watched her lay the pocket watch in his hand quietly and it instantly warmed the calloused rub of his palm. Her other hand closed over it so that it was tucked between their palms.

She looked up at him as a desperate mother.

All light eyes and pale skin.

Shaking hands.

"I know… she won't want this."

Wyatt nodded. "I know."

"Give it to Dorothy."

His head snapped back up in sudden confusion, having assumed that she would ask him to hand it over to the next in line, the oldest sister. His throat contracted as he swallowed and his head angled slightly, trying to pull from the way she was gripping against his hands. She fought the movement and stepped even closer to him, glance hardening in sincerity.

"Azkadellia will not use it to its full potential. It represents too much power. It scares her." She spoke slowly, "Dorothy can balance the power with nobility."

"It's dangerous." He shook his head again. "She's not - "

"She's always been ready." Lavender murmured in anticipation of his argument and Ahamo stepped up behind her with an equally severe glance.

"Az won't take it." Ahamo added quietly to the conversation. "Dorothy needs it."

"DG doesn't need - "

"It needs her." Lavender hadn't looked away from the iced blue of his eyes. "And the Zone needs the both of them."

Wyatt tensed his jaw and nodded in unhappy silence, closing his fist against it so that she would move her hands. Her fingers slowly slid away from his and he allowed himself a moment to look over the both of them, seeing concerned parents and certainly not the royal line that was fighting to regain ground. They were just the people that had given him his deliciously delightful little Princess. It was an odd enough moment that it chilled him and he forced himself to turn away, head lifted. After a few steps he paused, knowing they were still standing quiet behind him.

"Why give it to me?" he cocked his head back, "Why not just give it to her yourself?"

"At the moment, she trusts you more that her own parents, Tin Man." Ahamo's voice was surer and cleaner than the Queen's had been. "Faith in the hands of a dead man."

He clenched the watch in his hand in silence as he walked away toward where DG and Azkadellia were still, thankfully, waiting for him.

* * *

He met her with a sharp kiss, the hand with the watch clutched between them while the other caught up her jaw and pulled her into the heat of his mouth. There was a sudden urge to claim whatever innocence she'd glanced up at him with. If he could keep it, hold it safe, he could save something of it. She stuttered her response at first but sank into the kiss when he twined a strand of dark hair in his fingers. DG dropped a moan between them when he pulled away.

"Start walking, baby." He nodded his head toward where Zero was still, oddly patiently, waiting for them.

"We're walking into a trap." DG murmured as she and her sister aimed their steps in the same direction.

"It's not a trap if we know it's a trap." Azkadellia responded softly. "The illusion of surprise is broken."

Wyatt let himself move to her opposite side, fingers lifting the watch so that he could tick it open and look over the way the emerald flared in the light, the palm of his hand suddenly warming. DG sharply looked to the side and he heard to noise she made low in her throat.

"Where did you get that?"

"Your mother." He responded, fingers carefully trying to pry the emerald from the casing that he'd had it set in. "She wants you to have it for this."

DG stopped suddenly, "She should - "

"Deeg." Az cast a saddened but truthful glance back over her. "She did the right thing."

"I don't…" DG's blue eyes were suddenly wider than he'd seen them in days. "I don't want it."

Wyatt turned back full into her, finally popping the emerald into his palm before he looked up. "DG."

"I don't." she shook her head but her eyes slid closed in frustration. "Wyatt."

"I know." He dropped his voice to a barely perceptible pitch. "But we need you to take it."

"We?" her eyes flew open in stubborn argument.

"All of us." He responded gently. "Me and Az included."

The saddened nod she gave him broke guilt open in him and he couldn't look her in the eyes. His throat contracted hard as he tried to gulp down oxygen, ignoring the way she opened her palm quietly between them. Without a thought he stepped in closer, kissing her forehead softly while he pulled at the top hem of her shirt, letting the jewel tip from his palm and down into the tight press of the laces against her breasts.

"Wyatt." She hissed at him.

"I happen to know that nobody's getting their hand down there unless I'm damn cold unbreathing," he tried a smile between them but it was wavering. "Okay?"

She exhaled out through her nose, shaking her head slowly while he turned to her sister. He gave Az a gentle smile and leaned in almost as close, clipping the watch easily to her while she took the now empty casing into her hand. As he turned back between the two of them she tucked the case away but left the chain visible.

"Smart man." Az smiled to her sister. "He's tricky."

"He just copped a feel in the name of the Outer Zone." DG rolled her eyes. "He's more than tricky."

"All right ladies," he mocked a half bow toward the horizon line. "Let's go kill this bastard."

"You didn't want to kill him." DG answered as she started walking again, feeling Azkadellia's shoulder press her own. "Remember?"

"Because I was afraid that killing him would kill whatever I had left." He murmured softly, feeling her hand curl against his arm. "I'm not worried anymore."

"Besides." Azkadellia's voice was a lulled hush, "The Captain isn't the weapon, little sister."

DG nodded and tightened her fingers, feeling him lift his opposite hand to cover hers as they walked, "My own mother just made me the bullet in the gun and used the man I'm sleeping with the pull the trigger."

Her older sister's voice was husky and voided. "Welcome to the House of Gale."


	14. Chapter 14

"You have the most exquisite taste in women, Cain." Zero had started pacing slow and indolent as they'd neared within hearing. "I must say."

DG resisted the urge to look up at him, knowing that his jaw was twitching a clench without having to see the movement. She felt the rise and throwback of his shoulders and let her hand turn up to press against his stomach, feeling his hand catch hers so that the other still had a free trajectory toward his weapon.

"Your lovely wife." Zero slid up a knowing and intentionally sadistic smile. "Two pretty princesses."

"Wyatt." She clenched her arm solid against his stomach, blocking the jerk of his body.

Zero turned a laugh between them and spun around, pacing back the other way as his black leather encased arms crossed over his body. He was lazily lining one foot in front of the other, masking playfulness between them. DG cocked her head at and angle and noted the way his glance tipped toward her older sister.

"Jealous, Zero?" she asked quietly. "You can't be jealous because of me."

He just dipped her a searing smile, "Dear, Princess - "

"What do you want?" Az interrupted in a honeyed tone that actually made DG shudder. "I would like to know. You've drawn us in, Zero. Play your hand. Or can't you use it?"

"I have no weapons." He opened both his hands, one perfect and the other mangled, before sidling to a slow stop, turning toward them and leaning a step forward into Azkadellia's space.

DG felt her body jerk back on the sudden thrust of Wyatt's flexed palm and his other hand had already had the gun raised in a hard imaginary line that landed directly at the other man's temple. There was pale insanity in the eyes of the Longcoat as he laughed at the swift movement, his face crumpling serious as the sound died off his lips. He was shaking his head.

"I'm just the messenger." Zero murmured, stepping back slowly but keeping his eyes trained on Azkadellia's face. "You killed one evil to wake another, Princess. That emerald won't save you."

"Zero - "

The massive explosion that rebounded from behind her had been frighteningly expected but the way it rocked her body forward, tumbling into Cain's back by the force that racked against her… she couldn't hold her standing. She felt his side turn into hers, trying to catch the awkward way the both of them headed toward the ground while he took a shot at the other man. Zero had knowingly anticipated and already reached against Azkadellia, the withered and mangled hand catching in her hair to jerk her forward. DG tried to angle back up but Cain's hand was tight against her neck, keeping her down while he focused, eyes squinting.

Zero had opened his mouth to make a mocking rebuttal but howled hard into pain as Cain landed a trained shot into his kneecap. As he fell he jerked Az down and both her hands came up to twist against his wrist, already flaring white hot against his skin. He scrambled back but kept a hold, trying to draw her with him. DG pushed up from Cain's hip and tried to move forward.

"Don't." he hissed quietly. "Not yet."

"Az - "

"Not yet." He kept a broad palm spanned against the back of her neck, fingers tangled up in her hair in a gentler fashion than the hold Zero had on her sister. "Wait."

Wyatt didn't chance the glance back at the scene behind them, just knew that somewhere in the back of his head he was registering gunfire that wasn't his own. He angled his other hand, watching the way Azkadellia was staring tensely up at him from under the jerk of her own hair, both her hands burning hot on Zero's already sweltered and scalded wrist. He waited, timing her unruffled but awkward posture before he aimed another shot into the man's shoulder.

In the thrust of the shot slamming into him, Zero's hands loosed from her and in that moment Wyatt pulled his fingers smoothly away from DG's skin, aiming a guarding hand against her as she scrambled toward her sister. He stood slow, keeping the gun aimed on the other man as Azkadellia swung his wounded and wincing body down against the ground. DG caught against her sister's wrist, her fingers curling smooth and supportive.

Cain winced his head away from the sudden searing flare of green warm light that echoed around them, angling his eyes down but keeping the weapon poised where it had been. He tried to look back up when he heard the screaming but the flare of light roared pain into his eyes and he shielded them to see that it was neither of his girls doing the whined screaming.

In a swallow of honesty… he actually feared the two of them for a moment.

All bright furious eyes, dark hair, winsome limbs, and the flow of fierce angry power.

A whimpered noise broke past the scream and his throat constricted hard.

He knew that sound well enough, knew the slow slide of it escaping her lips.

"DG!" he felt his throat rasp. "Let him go. Stop."

The light faltered and fell and both of them stood beside a silent and burnt body, hands raised as though they'd been caught stealing something. He noted the way DG's fingers were still loose wrapped around her sister's wrist, slowly sliding along Azkadellia's forearm. He stepped slow toward the two of them, still keeping the gun trained on the unmoving man. Cain didn't necessarily have to look at Zero's prone body to know that, even if he was still lingering alive, he wasn't much of a threat. He could smell burning skin around them, could nearly taste the twinge of crisped hair.

"DG." He repeated softly. "Listen to me."

She made a sound of disagreement in her throat and leaned her head away, face tipping into her sister's shoulder. Azkadellia didn't make a move to comfort her, still staring over the other man with widened eyes. Her face was guilty and shocked sad. It wasn't a look he was at all used to seeing.

"Hey." His palm threaded along the younger woman's hip, chest lining to the side of her body, "Just me, baby."

The way she angled into him but still kept hold of her sister's wrist was oddly disconcerting. He ignored the awkward bend of her body and let his arm curl up around her waist, jaw rubbing against the top of her head while her rugged breathing shuddered into his throat.

"I didn't mean to - "

"You did what you had to." Az murmured in a slow and calculated tone. "You can let go, little sister."

Azkadellia pried her sister's fingers from her arm and turned into her, easing her arm into Wyatt's as she met his eyes over dark hair. He saw the uncomfortable twist of sorrow in hazel eyes and couldn't hold the glance long. Without thinking he tucked DG closer into his chest, aiming the revolver back down toward the still body. Az lifted both her hands and hushed them into her sister's hair, laying them against her ears as she nodded at him.

He winced, shut his eyes, and started to flex his fingers against the trigger.

The explosion from behind, and the way it threw her body from his, stopped him.

* * *

He screamed for his wife before he realized that the sound was raking course from his throat and the way she looked back at him was a silent answer. She was laying broken back against the boot trampled ground, her head leaned to the side while one of her hands shook up against her face, making sure that everything was still mostly intact. The tips of her fingers stroked the blood from the laceration that split her alabaster toned cheek. Ahamo tried to pull himself up and winced into the way his body lagged and screamed for rest.

He tried to shake the haze from this thoughts and his vision, pushing up from two palms that were pressed into the grass. His legs didn't answer at first but he leaned his shoulders forward, feeling them lag into motion behind him as he pressed toward her.

"Lavender." The lilt of her name on his tongue was far quieter than he'd meant it to be and he drew his knees scraping up against the ground as best he could.

He was comforted when he saw one of the soldiers draw up close to her, his hand catching against hers in what seemed a supportive move. It seemed that way…at first. Ahamo forced movement into his legs and treaded barely responsive feet against the slicked ground as he tried to stumble toward them, realizing that it was Jonah's hand that was holding both of hers down. The former Tin Man's other hand raised up and back, something clenched in his fist that blurred but seemed dark. He opened his mouth to try and say something, anything… Something to stop the downward movement of the other man's arm.

He didn't think he'd make it to her fast enough.

He reached for the gun that he thought was still tucked in his vest and sobbed a shattered noise when he found it missing.

* * *

Glitch laid quiet still for a moment, not understanding what had happened. His head was clanging and words, entire phrases and thoughts, were repeating but he couldn't make sense of a single one of them. The sky about him was flaring brighter than it had been moments before and the realization that he was flat and prone on his back was sudden and breath stalling. He tried to suck down oxygen into his unmoving lungs and felt a sturdy twang of pain break open in his chest as he coughed for more air, causing even more pain.

He realized, somewhere in jumbled thoughts, as he tried to move, that his left arm was laying limp and awkward at his side. Tentative fingers reached across his body and he suddenly flinched as the sound of gunshots rang above and around him. He shut his eyes and felt against his arm, the sticky heat of thin blood greeting him. He groaned and rolled his head to the side, ducking once again as another explosion rebounded from somewhere south of him. Glitch laid a look over his arm and noted the cuts, scrapes and already swollen twist of it. He laid the good palm over a particularly wide slice and tried to look around him, hearing a desperate whined yell from only a few feet away.

When he looked up, he could see that the Royal Consort couldn't fully stand from the ground. And he was crying.

* * *

"No." he couldn't see past the shine of sweat and almost tears mixing with the viscous red of blood that was coming from somewhere about his hairline. "No. No."

It was a rhythmic chant that he didn't realize was coming from panted lips as he scraped his aching body up off the ground and stumbled the near on fifteen feet to where she was laying too still. Wyatt didn't even recognize the fact that he'd already passed the place where her sister was trying to wipe slim hands against her face, sitting up awkwardly on the grassy field.

His knees broke jerkily onto the ground beside her, hands already sliding onto her body in a way that didn't just imply intimacy, but gentle care. Wyatt leaned over her face, not realizing that his own was slick with blood and grime and sweat. Her eyes were glassy and wide and the blue of them had grayed somewhat to further pale the color of her skin. She was too pale. Too translucent skinned and laying limp to the ground.

There was no fight or humor or teasing anywhere on her.

"You're bleeding." Her voice was vacant and awkward and the droll tone of it implied that she was far beyond shock and near unconscious. "I'm sorry."

"Listen to me." He whispered as he leaned over her, the shaking fingers of one hand laying along the side of her cheek while his thumb kept her from turning her head. "Damn it, baby. Listen."

She let her eyes roll closed and tighten in sullen annoyance, "You're loud. Stop… stop feeling so much."

"I won't." he argued sharply and tightened his fingers, knowing when she winced that the force of his fingers had the desired affect. "Are you listening?"

"Yes." DG opened her eyes again slowly. "Wyatt… are you okay?"

"I'm fine." He murmured and looked down over the rest of her body, noting that there wasn't necessarily an open or visible wound. Which meant that she'd probably whacked her head hard enough to send her into a full on concussion.

"You're bleeding." She argued and lifted her hand against the blood that was staining white-pale skin. "A lot."

"Forget it." He murmured and loosened the top lacing of her shirt, intentionally moving too quickly for her to fight him. "It'll stop."

His fingers slid against her skin, noting how shallow and slow her breathing was as he drew the emerald up into his palm. Cain took her hand off his forehead and laid her palm flat over the stone that he held loosely, disliking how pliable her movements were. His other hand closed both her palm and the emerald between his, eyes lifting back to hers. With a sucked in breath he nodded.

"You want a consort?" he dropped the words quiet and quick. "Make it happen."

She shook her head minutely and whimpered at the pain that ratcheted through her head at the movement, "I don't - "

"I'm not doing this alone again, DG." His breathing shuddered as he lowered his forehead to nearly touch hers. "And as soon as I know you're all right I'm going back there. Use it."

"I'm fine." She whispered but her other hand touched against his, steadying there. "Go help them."

"You either heal yourself right now," his eyes flared lighter and she noticed how strangely they brightened with tears and blood in them, "and I don't have to worry about you being hurt - or you make it happen right now and when I leave it's done. Whether I come back here or not. I'm yours. You're mine."

Her face was paler than it had been, "You're not making sense."

"Dead men." Wyatt could hear the tremor in his voice and realized with a cold shiver that she wasn't the only one going into shock. "Dead men… they don't care. They don't have a place to come back to… they don't - "

"Shut up." Her fingers clenched closed against his and he stopped talking. "I don't know if I can - "

"Dorothy." He breathed her full name against her cheek and it was the first time she remembered having heard it said with such soft and aching affection.

It was as close as he could get to saying it.

His blood was cool against her skin and it made her clench their touching hands closer, the emerald digging and scraping their palms as he let more weight settle against her, his body swaying slightly with what she assumed was blood loss. He had to be hurt somewhere else to be that pale and leaning. She let her eyes close, blocking a mental wall against the rebounding pain that was back and forth behind her eyes and somewhere in the back of her skull. She felt the emerald go hot in her palm as soon as she begged its help and she heard him groan as it turned scalding between them.

"Don't let go." She whispered against his now damp and gritty cheek. "Don't let go or it's not going to - "

"I know." He breathed a kiss against her cheek as she refocused.

He felt the tingle of heat warming up his arm, first the right and then the left. Confusion knitted his brow and where there had been pain before, a tingling numbness dulled on his skin. Wyatt let his eyes open and glared hard at her, realizing that she was already staring quietly over his face with an intentionally stubborn glance.

"I told you to heal yourself." He gritted between his teeth, body clenching tight as the pain pushed out of him.

"And I told you to shut up." She answered, her shoulders shivering against the ground as the stone vibrated in their hands. "Consort."

"You didn't - "

"Don't let go."

A volley of shattering pain slammed up through his palm and into his the wrist of one hand but it was blinding enough that he couldn't even tell which one it was. As quickly as it had come, it was already gone and he was suddenly flushed hot and sweating. Wyatt dropped his jaw down against the break of her shoulder as she groaned into his temple, both her hands clenching harder into his. She wasn't shaking anymore, her body perfectly still beneath him, hands finally going loose under him.

"What did you just do?" he asked and slowly lifted his head, finding her eyes bright and warm and no longer as voided as they were. "DG?"

"Exactly what you asked me to do." She answered slowly, pulling their hands apart, "I think."

He leaned back as she pushed up against him, letting their hands separate so that the emerald landed somewhere in her lap. The same mark, the symbol that had flared on her palm once before was lingering on both their hands. Wyatt swallowed hard and looked up, meeting her eyes quietly. He left that hand lowered to hers while the other lifted to run the back of her head, searching for a wound or swelling of any kind.

"I'm fine." She nodded and pushed at his chest. "Go."

"You finally listened to me." An almost smile perked his lips.

DG just let her eyes slip closed as he leaned a kiss against her forehead, fingers rubbing against the collar of his blood stained shirt. "Go help them. Please?"

He nodded and started to move but she caught against the shirt, "Wyatt?"

"I'll come back." He nodded in certainty.

DG let go and watched him flex the marked palm closed as he pulled it from her lap. "You'd fucking better."

* * *

He was doing his best to reload while making a quick run toward where the Longcoats were flooding into his men from the south. Some of them were on horseback and some of them were running just as fast, if not faster, than he was. His eyes jerked back down to the weapon in his hands and as he tried to fumble another bullet into the gun he stumbled jerked to an awkward and nearly tumbling stop on the grass.

One hand still flared a perfect circle in his palm, the beauty of it shaking him slightly as the gun went loose in his hand. The other hand shivered just as much, a single metal band still wrapping the ring finger. He winced at the irony and shook it off, reverting his focus back to the weapon in hand, trying to ignore the fact that both women he loved had made marks upon his hands. Her father's words had a habit of circling back round in his head.

He jammed the gun with ammunition and leaned back into an awkwardly aching run.


	15. Chapter 15

Glitch stood with his good arm pressing against the ground, keeping his body hunched while he leaned his body up behind the wagon. His upper torso pressed against the wooden rail of it, feeling the way one of the Viewers that had come with him caught against his waist and helped pull him into the shadowed cover. The silent movement was accompanied by a sympathetic look that reminded him of Raw and instantly made him ache for his friend.

"Shhh." The Viewer leaned him to sit low against the wheel of the wagon and nodded into a smile, head turning back up to gauge what was still happening on the other side of the wagon. Glitch nodded and shook off the daze that was still volleying through his head, blinking as he tried to slim his thoughts down to one thread instead of many.

"We need weapons."

"Need to rest." The Viewer laid a calloused and hairy palm against his good shoulder, still watching over the other side of the wagon. "Rest."

He didn't have time to argue before the Viewer ducked from behind the wagon and disappeared, a doomed knife in a gun fight.

* * *

She was still trying to shake the dizzy feeling from her head, leaning over where Azkadellia was still bent to her knees on the ground. DG let her hands press against her sister's shoulders and she bent forward, leaning her body down beside the older woman. One hand stayed against now tangled dark hair. The other rubbed at her own cheek, wiping at the cooled and tacky blood that she was sure was not hers.

"Az?"

"Zero's gone." Azkadellia was staring at her hands in a blank daze that unnerved the younger woman.

"We had to - "

"I mean," Hazel eyes lifted as sharp darkened points. "his body is gone. He wasn't dead, Deeg."

DG turned her head back sharply to realize that her sister was right and that the place he had been laying showed only the scarred terrain of the explosion, "Are you…you're sure?"

Azkadellia just nodded and used both hands to wipe her hair from her face, already shifting to rise from the ground, "I'm sure."

DG just nodded quietly and looked out toward the fight that lay before them. Her eyes followed the movements of men but she couldn't single anyone out. She'd already lost sight of Cain by the time she'd reached her sister and she couldn't make anyone else out in particular either. They weren't all that far away but… far enough. She put her hand out, unthinking of the mark that still glowed warmly as she offered it to her sister. Azkadellia eyed the mark quietly and then looked up with an emotional mix of amusement, happiness, and a strange twinge of loss.

"You did it." She whispered and traced against her sister's palm, fingertip rounding the circle. "You didn't question it… you just did it."

DG looked over her hand and shrugged. "It's what he wanted. It's what I wanted. It was actually pretty easy."

"You - "

"Mother and father." DG reminded her softly. "C'mon, Az."

The older woman just nodded but avoided taking the faintly glowing hand, instead curling her fingers against her sister's bicep, trying to give off a smile, "Well, of course. I can't wait for them to see that mark before it fades."

* * *

She stared hard at the gun in her hand, unsure of why she'd taken it except that in some way she thought that it had meant safety, protection. It wasn't as heavy as she'd expected it to be. And it was warmer than she figured on. Darcy blew out her breath and used the other hand to wipe against the sweat that was crowding her forehead, peeking up from behind the makeshift cover she'd made from another soldier's body, eyes following the movements of the man she'd stolen the weapon from.

He was waking up… he was… He was very familiar. She ducked hard against the dead man's body, tugging against his bloody shirt so that he made a better wall against the shots one of the Longcoats was firing. Her hands closed against the gun and she looked back up over the body, frowning in sudden weary sadness when she realized that he was searching for the stolen weapon. His face was desperate and the gasped swell of tears…

He was…

She realized instantly who he was and swallowed hard, following his glance to where the Queen had been knocked clean to the ground by the second explosive blast. Darcy pushed up away from the fallen soldier, gripping the gun in her hand as she started toward him. Her body ducked awkwardly at the sound of a shot ringing toward her left and she stumbled back down to the ground for a moment. She meant to move toward him… She looked up to the solider that was leaned over her Queen and instantly changed her mind.

* * *

Lavender knew that time was entirely dependent on how it was received by the person partaking in its movement. It was a fluid thing that could speed or slow, race or stop abrupt. It was a breathe, a stutter, a year, an infinity. She wasn't quite sure what had happened to cause the bouncing pain in her head but… she knew that time was lagging low and sluggish.

That time, the way she was perceiving it, was caught up on a two decade delay.

Azkadellia was young and precocious. Sweet-hearted and wild-eyed.

And Dorothy was a screaming bundle of baby in her arms.

"_She's likes me." _

The younger sister had always hushed when Azkadellia had peeked a pair of mixed color eyes into her wailing face.

"_See?"_

"I see." She whispered and closed her eyes, trying to fight the hand that was holding tight on both her wrists. Trying to fight time and the inevitability of his movements. She used the strength she had in her to further curb the tidal wake that time made, bending it slow and sluggish in comparison to the world around them.

"I'm sorry." Jonah's voice was a gasping plunge of dread as his hand lifted back, a rock curled in his fist. "I'm - "

She opened her eyes wide, looking into the distorted face of the man above her, "I see, Jonah."

He paused as though he was fighting the movement of his own body.

It wasn't long before he started the downward movement of his arm.

But it was long enough.

* * *

He squeezed the trigger again, this time running at the full speed of Ahamo's scream, but missing his target by a miniscule mark for the second time. They were too damn far away. Cain took aim again, ready to take another shot but his feet stuttered him to a sudden full stop as another gunshot took his quarry from another angle. The shot hit his old comrade full in the chest, the force of it swaying Jonah's body back hard and seemingly in slow motion.

Wyatt loosened his finger from the trigger, keeping it aimed on the now gasping man, looking in the direction the shot had come from. He found a small and shaking boy… no… It was that damn stubborn little girl, he was sure of it. He swallowed as her hands both shook with the weight of the weapon and the heaviness of what she had just done.

He slowed his run, bending his hand to Ahamo's shoulder as he man still struggled against disagreeing legs. Ahamo shook him off and aimed a hand at his wife, leaning his body back to that he could sit. Cain dropped the hand that held the weapon, offering it to the other man and nodded quietly.

"You." He told the other man. "Cover my ass."

Ahamo nodded and took the gun, fingers clenching it hard when the open hand of the man before him flared light into his eyes. The mark was a familiar reminder of the heat that he still carried in the flex of his own palm. He looked up and found a nearly gentle apology in Cain's glance before he just jerked his head back toward his wife.

"Go." He hissed against the pain in his body but leveled the weapon to aim for any remaining Longcoats. "Check on her, Consort."

He moved with caution, ignoring the grit in Ahamo's tone and aiming the other hand at the girl who was staring wide at him with a pair of young brown eyes. He waved her closer and moved toward where Jonah's body was heaving for oxygen at a perpendicular line to the Queen's relaxed form. He stepped nervously over Hays' shivering legs and crouched, a glance up to be sure that the girl had done as asked. She leaned over the three of them with the gun shaking in Jonah's direction.

He noted, silently as he smiled down over the Queen's release of relieved breath, that the surrounding gunfire was starting to dull and quiet. Wyatt laid his hand against hers and met the tired look she panned up at him. He smiled wider, knowing that she would take comfort in the fact that he could smile down on her. Knowing that she would realize that the ease in his eyes would mean the safety of her children. Lavender just caught against his fingers and swallowed hard.

"It's not his fault." Her head lolled wearily at an angle, eyes turning toward where Jonah was laying. "It's not - "

"Okay." Wyatt leaned away from her and stretched toward the other man, face hardening as soon as she couldn't see the tint of his eyes.

Jonah tried to speak to him but whatever the words, they just bubbled into the foamed blood that spattered off his bottom lip. Wyatt felt his jaw tamp down as his teeth gritted against each other. He shook his head but quietly reached for the other man's hand, feeling the way Jonah jerked at his fingers.

"It wasn't him, Wyatt." The Queen's voice was sure and less dazed, closer as she forced her body into a sitting position. "Look at his eyes, Tin Man. See what he's telling you."

Wyatt washed a suddenly very weary glance down over his former comrade, watching as Jonah lifted their clenched and equally blood drenched hands against his chest. Cain grimaced against the would and tried to pull away but Jonah coughed up a swath of blood onto his bottom lip and tugged the fair-haired man's hand against his chest again. Wyatt nodded quietly, finally understanding and digging under the lapel of his friend's jacket, prying the star that was still pinned to his shirt from under blood wetted fabric. He lifted it higher on his friend's shoulder and laid his other palm smooth against it.

"I get it." Wyatt murmured with a gentled nod. "I do, Jonah. It's okay."

Lavender moved unsteadily into his side and her hand reached out for the man's ashen forehead, her fingers rubbing gentle on his chilled skin. "Close your eyes, Officer Hays. It's all right."

"Your boy." Wyatt forced a nodding smile as the other man resigned and shut his eyes, "He's probably missed you."

He couldn't watch the other man die… but he had to.

And he appreciated the fact that she didn't move from beside them both until after.

* * *

She couldn't help but move faster when she saw the way Tutor was leaned carefully over her father, his hands pressing and testing the man's leg's with slow and gentle movements. DG broke into a hard run, tugging away from her sister so that she could stumble into a kneel beside Ahamo, her breathing ragged as she caught against his arm. His face opened with emotion as he realized she was the one leaned against his shoulder and he quietly accepted the hug she gave, his arm looping up to cup her head against his.

"I'm glad you're safe." He whispered and winced suddenly at the way Tutor was lifting one of his legs. "Jesus Christ."

DG kissed against the side of his head in a show of affection that even surprised her, eyes roving down over his body. "What happened?"

"First explosion took most of us down." He murmured and put both his hands down to lift against his thigh, forcing his knee to bend. "Second knocked your mother out cold and the Longcoats came in from the south. Hays set everything."

"Jonah?" she seemed surprised and personally hurt by what she assumed was blatant betrayal.

And then sudden worry scuttled her breathing. "Does Wyatt - "

"He's fine." There was a hardness to his voice that softened up a bit when he saw the wear of desperation in her eyes. "Behind us."

DG looked up as Azkadellia moved closer to them, her hand reaching out to grasp at her father's outstretched fingers. The younger of the two women barely noticed their greeting as she looked to where her mother was whispering over her Cain. Lavender's hand was pressed softly to the side of his head as she spoke over him and Jonah's body and DG was at once nervous as to what she was saying and touched by her mother's gentleness.

"Go on." Az poked at her hip sharply, "Check on him."

"I'll go in a minute." DG whispered and tried to supportively smile at the way her father was trying to work his knees by forcing them to bend.

"Go." He angled a glance up at her and stilled his movements. "He takes care of you, you take care of him. That's how it works, DG."

His eyes fell to her closed hand and she knew instantly that he'd seen the mark on one of them. "Go."

* * *

"Whoever is feeding Zero's thirst for revenge is not above controlling those who are weak willed." Lavender spoke gently as DG moved close to them. "They used Jonah against us. Against himself."

"He struggled with Azkadellia being here." Wyatt shook his head, not looking up at her, even when she lowered her hand to brush his jaw and cup supportive at the side of his face. "He couldn't get past it."

"Zero's gone but I doubt he got away on his own. He was in rough condition." DG murmured quietly to her mother as she crouched, her hand forcing him to look at her while the other lifted to press the other side of his face. "And this is not your fault."

"Are you all right?" he blatantly ignored her admonition, clenching Jonah's star in his closed fist.

"I'm fine, cowboy." She nodded the whisper into the way she wiped the blood from off his lips and leaned a soft kiss into them. "You're still bleeding."

"It'll stop." He let her lips linger close to his, feeling her mother move away from them quietly and back toward Ahamo again. "Your father would like to have me castrated."

"Sometimes so would I." she teased to words against him and pressed her forehead to his, forcing him to smile as she leaned in hard against him. "Are you okay?"

"Me? I'll be fine, baby." His palm lifted lamely between them and he gave her a shattering giddy grin that made him look all of a boyish twelve, "I'm glowing."

DG let her eyes close into relieved and exhausted laughter as his hand lifted to the side of her head, fingers threading into her tangled hair. "Hush it, Bright Eyes."

"Yes, Princess."

* * *

He watched her head toward Glitch, her movements breaking into a run as the man leaned awkwardly, but mostly whole, against the back of the wagon. Cain nodded and breathed in through his nose, starting to turn back toward the body of the other Tin Man but startling into the small-framed blonde that had a gun pointed in his direction. Her brown eyes were still wide-scared and her hands still tight against the weapon.

"Whoa." He hushed his voice and curled his palm against the pistol, slowly prying it from her fingers, "I got it, kiddo."

"Is it over?" she asked quietly, her shoulders straightening back as she made a solid attempt to compose herself.

Wyatt dipped his head, "It is for the moment, I think. What's your name?"

"Darcy." She spoke quietly. "I'm sorry."

Wyatt just let his mouth turn in a reflexive but emotionless smile, "It's okay. You did what you had to."

He caught sight of one of the officers moving up behind her, a stern look on his haggard face as he headed straight for them. Wyatt nodded to her and put a hand to her arm, knowing that he was about to get back into business. He scattered a glance at the bodies and wounded men that surrounded them.

"Think you could help the Princess for me?" he aimed her toward the wagon. "She's going to tell you what she needs you to do, okay?"

"Hey, Darcy?" he threw after her as she nodded and stepped toward where DG was checking over their companion. "How old are you?"

She shrugged at him, "Fourteen."

Damn it… she was a baby and she'd just killed a man.

And it had already sorrowed and stained the brown of her eyes.


	16. Chapter 16

"Sorry I can't do more." DG wiped the back of her hand against her sweaty and grimed forehead, blowing her breath out hard enough to ruffle the waves of dark hair that were starting to annoyingly crowd her face.

Glitch gave her a pale smile and nodded, looking down over the sling, "Matches my outfit."

"How's the pain?" she asked as she rubbed against his knee, glancing down over the way he was dangling his legs from the back of the wagon that she'd leaned him into.

"S'okay." Glitch shrugged, still far quieter than he normally was.

She moved to speak but paused when he suddenly looked up at her with bright excited eyes, obviously remembering something that had slipped the disjointed circuitry of his thoughts. He reached higher up the wagon, tipping his body at such a steep angle that DG nearly laughed as she held his counterbalance with a hand on his leg.

"Glitch." She laughed through his name, "What are you - "

"This." He swung the hat from the inside of the wagon and lifted it between them with his good arm, a truly ecstatic grin lighting his face. "Found it under the wagon."

She let a laugh flood uncontrolled off her lips and hugged it gently into her chest, doing her best not to crush it any more than it already was. "Thank you, Glitch."

He just grinned knowingly as he shrugged at her in return. "He's sorta funny lookin' without it."

* * *

He watched the sky melt wet while tipping his head back, gulping for breath as he leaned on the overgrown branch he was using as a shovel. Wyatt tipped his head back farther, spitting blood to the side as the slow silting rainwater washed it into his eyes and over his lips into his open mouth. His head shook slowly back and forth as it started to weigh heavier over his face, the graying of the sky starting to mimic and mime the darkness of his mood.

"Fitting." He wiped the once white sleeve of his shirt against his face, staring at the way it mingled brown and red and dingy as he let his arm drop.

His eyes drifted back down over the body of his friend, swallowing hard as he watched the rain start to tint Jonah's shirt a darker blue. He lifted the branch up and let the force of his movement carry it up past his shoulders before jerking it down into the pile of dirt that was mudding beside the hole. Wyatt pulled his eyes away from Jonah's unmoving body and started shoveling the now heavier dirt over him, wincing at the hollow echoing of it hitting the body.

He couldn't stop the thought that echoed with each thump…

It was the sound his son had heard.

It was the echo of Adora's death and he knew the boy undoubtedly heard it in his sleep – when he slept at all. He'd gained more from his father than just fair hair and gruff demeanor.

Even as he stop shoveling, he could still hear it.

He'd heard it bounce and reverberate inside a tin prison for annuals.

It rebounded in his head at the same rate of the echo of his heartbeat in his ears.

"Wyatt."

He jumped and swung the pistol toward her, not realizing that he'd already palmed the weapon instinctively. The branch was forgotten and thoughtlessly tipped onto the mostly diminished pile of soil. DG only stared stoically at him, an eyebrow lifting as the flat of her marked palm turned the mouth of the gun away from herself and into clear air. The darkness of the blue in her eyes was marred by the blur of rain and blood and grit in his own.

Maybe there were tears.

He wouldn't ever admit there were, and she wouldn't ever make him fess to it.

That's why he loved her.

She knew when to push.

She knew when to lull.

She knew when to just be. And let him be.

Let him melt sadly slow in the sky water.

"Hey." She lifted her hand slowly between them, cocking him a mostly sure smile. "You needed a shower anyhow."

He let the hand with the revolver drop useless to his side, shoulders slumping as she curved her palm against his jaw. Cain tensed at first, bracing against her as she leaned into his sodden shirt and kissed his lips softly. He let his eyes closed, using his other hand to dig into damp dark curled hair so that he could tug her head back enough to control the kiss she was offering as comfort.

He forgot how grubby and disgusting he felt, forgot the tang of metallic blood in his mouth, forgot that he was slickened with mud and the stench of a dead man. He even forgot the gun that he'd put more faith in than anything else until the first time he'd curled around her from behind. The intimacy of that moment… not more than a few days ago. He'd forgotten that they hadn't really lived a lifetime since then.

The moan she poured into his mouth as his hand unconsciously fisted harder in her hair and jerked her back was what brought him back 'round to realizing that he was being rougher with her than she probably expected him to be. He sucked gently on her tongue to soothe the sudden desperation he'd breathed into her lungs. Wyatt pulled from the kiss slowly, watching the way the rain was tracking down her face in dirty rivulets. It made him smile – a real smile.

"You're a shoddy mess, Princess." He slid the gun back into its holster carefully.

DG just nodded, eyes slimming in an affectionate tease, "Learned from the best, Consort."

He groaned audibly at the way the breath in the word made his groin flash-pan heat and heart. "Don't do that."

"You're hot." She whispered and wiped the messy mix off the rise of one cheekbone, "I mean feverish hot."

"I'll be all right." He nodded.

"Wyatt."

"I'll be fine." He interrupted and gave her a suddenly sweet wink. "I'm just - "

"Flushed." She grinned at him as though she'd won a prize of some sort.

Wyatt rolled his eyes and loosened his fingers from her hair, tucking a wet strand off her cheek and behind her ear before turning back to the graveside. He used the inside dip of his boot to shove the last of the mud-thick dirt over the grave, kicking the stick away with a gentle nudge of his toe. He rocked forward slightly when she suddenly hugged him hard and tight from behind, her arms looping around the sturdy pressed thrum of his rib cage. He realized then that she had his hat in her fingers and it was clutched against his stomach in a nearly comical fashion.

"DG." He sighed out her name softly, "Where in the hell'd you find that?"

"Glitch found it." She mumbled into the line of his spine, her face nudging and rubbing half down his back. "Said you look funny without it."

"I bet he did." He tugged it from her fingers and pulled it down hard on his head. "C'mere."

His hands met hers and he pulled them from his chest, tugging her forward so that they had reversed places and he was curled comfortably around her, chin jutting against her collarbone while he nuzzled her hair from his cheek. She tried to meet his hands with her own but he shied away from the movement, holding his hands up in front of her. Her face stalled between a mix of two emotions at seeing the both of them, both rings, sparkled in rain water. Her throat tightened down and she stilled her body entirely, waiting for him to move.

"I'm sorry." He leaned the words into the side of her face.

"I didn't say anything." She shook her head.

"I know." He let a rush of breath down against her shoulder, his hands folding over her stomach so that she could finally cover them with her own. "Still."

"I didn't ask you to take it off, Wyatt." Her head cocked slightly so that she could try and see his face beneath the brim of his hat but the movement failed. "I didn't."

He nodded and clutched his fingers into her stomach, groaning his face down into her shoulder. She felt him let his weight lay into her, body tired and heaving with physical and emotional exhaustion. She'd been fighting the swell of it herself. His mouth tingled slow and comfortably against her neck, one of his hands looping back to pull her hair away, mouth laying against her throat at a cocked angle. She let her eyes slip closed, trying to ignore where they were standing and what had just happened. Reveling in the heat of his tongue and teeth sucking and tracing a red swell on her skin.

It didn't last long.

"Captain Cain." She admonished softly. "You have a very tired battalion to see to."

"Mmm." He kissed behind her ear chastely. "Princess?"

She made a questioning noise, leaning back to smile into the way he was looking over her rain spattered profile. "What?"

"You're a cruel woman."

DG winked playfully back at him, "Sucker."

* * *

There was an awkward shunting in her chest as she watched her father lean his weight onto the makeshift cane that had been fashioned for him. He looked suddenly completely shattered and exhausted and the agile smile that she'd come to know was his trademark had failed him. Not only was he pale, in the reflection of the metal-toned sky he was completely ashen. DG moved faster toward him, a hand leading out to his side as she leaned her weight up under his other arm.

"You don't need to do that." He betrayed his own words by kissing the top of her head with tired affection.

"I'm walking you to the wagon and you're staying there until we get to Finaqua."

Ahamo stared down over the dark crown of her head as she aimed him toward the wagon, half smirking into the full force she had intentionally laced into her words. The nervous shaking of her voice had betrayed her and he just silenced any argument he would have had in favor of allowing her to comfort and control. She needed to do so, and he wasn't about to push away an ounce of affection she was willing to supply him with.

"It's another few hours at least." He spoke gently. "I don't know how many of these men can start right back up again, DG."

"Cain's talking to them." She didn't look up at the mention of the other man, just focused on the end point of their slow movements.

He let up a light laugh, "You can call him by his first name, Dorothy."

DG felt her throat warm at the knowing words he whispered over her. "I do."

"I'm saying - "

"I know you know." She finally looked up and he was surprised by the mix of emotions that flicked through tired blue eyes. "I don't want to fight."

"I'm not fighting." Ahamo bent a kiss warm onto her forehead, "Sweetie, the fight's outta this old man for a few hours."

"You're not old." She grumbled and kept him moving. "Just heavy."

* * *

"They can do it." He nodded assuredly at the woman before him, noting that Az was silently chewing against her bottom lip behind the Queen.

Lavender let her brows pinch in nervous consideration, "I'm not quite so sure, Captain."

"They can do it." He repeated slowly and quietly, looking back at the handful of soldiers he had appointed as leads. "They want to be done with it."

"Azkadellia," she angled her head back. "How able are you?"

"Able?" the younger woman questioned in confusion. "Able to do what?"

Lavender looked back slowly at the younger woman, a hand reaching out to thoughtlessly fix the knotted tangle of dark hair. The confusion slowly paled from the princess's face and she looked toward the wagon where DG was helping their father into the back of it. She chewed her lip harder and nodded slowly before looking quietly and solemnly back to her mother.

"I can try."

Wyatt passed a glance back and forth between the two women. "Try what?"

"A travel storm." Az answered in a hush. "It would mean staying back while pushing them forward."

"We discussed this in Central City." Cain argued as he stepped forward into a hushed tone, his eyes avoiding the Queen's and focusing on hers. "You said yourself that it would be impossible for one, even two of you, to move everyone."

"Not everyone." The Queen interjected quietly. "Just those that need to be protected."

"The entire royal line should be protected, your Majesty." His tone was starting to unravel, a mixture of frustration and the desperate need to be understood.

He couldn't be in two places at once.

He couldn't save two sisters, two parents, and an army…

He couldn't necessarily even save himself…

"You said yourself," the Queen repeated his words back to him, only to have Azkadellia finish them off.

"Dorothy is more of a priority."

"Why?" he breathed out quickly, "I know why she is to me. Why for the Zone? Why Dorothy and neither of you? Who stays behind and - "

"Because, whether she knows it or not, Dorothy has placed herself in the position of power, Cain." Azkadellia's voice rose and slapped into him full force. "Don't you understand what is happening?"

"I don't." he hissed back at her and jumped when Lavender's hand reached for his face to still and comfort him.

She ignored his jerked movement and reached forward anyhow, lifting his jaw, "Look at me, Tin Man… Consort."

"That has nothing to do with what you're - "

"It does." Lavender whispered with a sad smile, nodding slowly. "It does, Wyatt."

"Why?" he repeated again. "Why sacrifice one daughter for another?"

"She's not." Az shook her head in appreciative understanding, "Cain… she's not."

"She's leaving you defenseless." He argued but didn't pull his eyes from the older woman's.

"I am not." Lavender stated simply. "I'm staying with her."

He shook his head, "Obviously I'm too simple a man because I don't understand what you mean to do or why you're doing it."

The younger of the two women reached for his hand and pulled him away from her mother, drawing his arm up so that she could loop her own in it as she aimed him toward the wagon. Cain let her sturdy gait and somewhat calmer demeanor lull him a little, eyes flicking to where DG was curiously watching them advance. Her eyes were a brilliant mash of inquisitive blue and a hazy calm green of light.

She had nudged her shoulder against her father's in the back of the wagon, letting her feet dangle from the edge, "Listen, Big Sister… I'm not into sharing."

Az smirked in reply and her and loosened her hold on his arm, "I'm only bringing him to you so that you can explain to him why mother and I are staying behind."

A sudden sadness wrecked the humored lilt of her smile and he watched it fall away as she looked between her sister, her father, and back to him. DG hushed her body forward and slowly slid off the edge of the wagon, the boots Az had given her days before now muddied and sliding in the swampy tack and pull. He laid his hand onto her hip, holding her balance as she smiled sadly up at him.

"This is how it has to be, Bright Eyes. They stay behind. I go forward."

"Ya know, Princess? Your family is chock full of egotistical cryptic mysticism," he cockily remarked back, "And yet I don't hear any sound strategic planning."

The broad chuckle that Ahamo laid out over them only served to support his cynicism. "He's right girls."

Her palm opened up between them, the mark still visible but glowing fainter, "Can I borrow your razor?"

His head jolted at a sharp angle as she repeated a moment that had lived between them before. Confusion narrowed his eyes as he slid his hand into the inside of his vest and pulled the straight razor out slowly, using his own marked palm to lay it into her hand gently. DG grinned when heat instantly flashed it hot between their hands but he still refused to lift his hand from hers. Wyatt held her glance, eyes flickering brighter as she smiled even wider.

"You didn't let me have it last time."

"You were going to do something stupid with it."

"No." she shook her head slowly, the smile still riding cockily on her thin but perfectly lined lips. "You didn't trust me."

"Your brilliant strategy is for me to trust you?" he gripped the closed razor between their hands and closed their palms together, the heat starting to tingle up his arm. "No wonder you need a body guard. What'd I tell you about trusting people?"

"The Queen is losing power." Her voice drummed quiet but solid, "My sister doesn't want the throne and I have the emerald because it chose me, Cain."

"And now you have a Consort." He murmured in quiet understanding, face flinching in slight embarrassment.

He'd forced her into the position of heir as quickly and easily as her own family had.

"A failing ruler, the familial right, the power of the Zone, and the ability to carry on the royal line." DG shrugged. "All the things a good girl needs to take over the Outer Zone."

"I'm sorry." He whispered it quietly. "I'm sorry I - "

"For what?" she asked quietly, the other hand lifting to hold his chin up, refusing him the urge to avoid the brilliant blue of her eyes. "For showing me that you let yourself love me? The silly kid that hammered you out of a cage and then badgered you to hell and back? I'm not sorry, Wyatt."

"Citing 'fate' is not a sound strategy for war." He changed the subject deftly. "I still don't think the three of you should be separated right now. Not when we're this close."

"That's not what bothers you." DG tapped her fingertip at his bottom lip and slowly pulled their hands apart, taking the straight razor from him with ease.

"Then what is?" he asked with renewed force in his voice.

"You know I'm going to order you to stay here to protect them." DG turned and easily hauled herself back up onto the back of the wagon, turning a knowing glance on him. "And you know that if you refuse an order I'll just beg you with those wiles you accused me of days ago."

"And?" he looked down over the flat of his palm.

"And you know that you can't deny me anything anymore." She said and leaned her shoulder back into the way her father was watching him with sadly knowing but almost amused eyes. "Not that you really could before, Tin Man."

She lifted the razor with a knowing look toward his pale face. "I go forward. They stay back."

He merely blinked, "And then what?"

"Tin Men follow through." She put the closed razor against her lips and tapped it there thoughtfully. "At least that's what I've heard."

"This one does." Azkadellia said gently from beside him.

"I'd like you all to know that I'm starting to dislike this family with a severe, severe, intensity." He rolled his eyes between them.

Ahamo just laughed again, "You married into it, my friend."

Wyatt just grunted and shook his head, "Not technically."

It was DG's voice that caught him up as he turned away, "Not yet."

Damn her for being right…


	17. Chapter 17

"You miss your Viewer friend." Az gave the former advisor a comforting smile. "Don't you?"

Glitch just waved his good hand away from them while nodding in embarrassed agreement. His eyes lifted to meet hers and she saw clear emotion swimming in them. Az tucked against his side and led him toward where most of her family was lingering by the wagon, letting her body lean comfortably into his. There was no recoiling from him, no shying away. It was nice to find another safety when half the soldiers were staring awkwardly at her. Sometimes afraid, sometimes angry, sometimes with disgust.

"He'll join us in Finaqua, yes?" she intentionally made her voice upbeat, smiling at the way Glitch was smiling down over her dirty and tired face.

"Thank you." He said softly.

Az just nodded once, "You're welcome."

* * *

"You know what I like?" she jumped easily at the taunting tone of his voice, her head turning sharply toward him.

DG playfully pretended to pout her lips out, "Hmmm. Me?"

"That I do." Wyatt tugged the hat off his head and tossed it into the back of the wagon before moving easily to her side, hand catching hers and tugging. "We need to talk."

"Boring." She rolled her eyes but allowed him to tug her body up beside his, the hand he'd been pulling with sliding back to cup her lower back.

She leaned easily into the way he walked her toward a nearby copse of trees, not even thinking to look behind them toward where everyone was waiting. They could wait another ten minutes. She wasn't going to deny him whatever words he wanted to give her. It wasn't often he gave her all that many to begin with. DG leaned her cheek onto his shoulder, curling into his side so that her hand could lift to settle in the crease of his vest while he hugged her tighter into his side.

They were both still damp but he hugged her warm to his side, "I like that you think you're cute when you're being all haughty and royal."

DG grinned into the way he'd mumbled the words into her hair. "You think it's sexy, buddy. Don't pretend you don't."

"I like that you think you control me," His hand sloped down off her back to cup against her as he stopped walking and swung her into his chest. "Princess."

"I don't." she argued. "I - "

"Shhh." His eyes were an intense blue in the remaining light that played between the fluttering leaves of the tree he'd aimed her under. "Stop talking."

"Don't say goodbye." She shook her head, ignoring his words.

"Wasn't going to." He was testing and tasting her kisses slowly, hands digging in her hair again while he pressed his lower body flush to hers. "I'm making one of those promises you seem to like so much."

"Really?" she dragged the word out, fixing his vest even though it needed no fixing, body nervous and jittery.

"You have to make me one too." He leaned tighter into her, dragging her hips even harder into his as he let his forehead press against hers.

"Maybe." DG gave him a grin, letting him sip another kiss off her lips.

"You promise to find me the biggest, softest, cleanest bed in that big bad palace…"

She sucked a breath in through her parted lips, letting his hands slid down to curve her rib cage while his eyes roved over the angles of her face. "And?"

"After I get there and clean up, I promise not to let you leave it for a good twelve hours." His eyelids had dipped a little before he kissed her hard, prying her body tight into his.

"We'll need to sleep at some point." She laughed a tease at him as she drew her mouth from him.

Wyatt just shrugged and stepped back, pulling her back toward the men that were waiting for his signal yards behind them, "Twenty four hours then."

DG arched an eyebrow, "You're awfully sure of your prowess, cowboy."

"Consort." He corrected smoothly and smugly, tugging her hard by the hand so that she was drawn back tight into them, her hand laced nearly painfully in his. "Promise me."

"I promise." She closed her eyes and let him lead her, face rubbed back into the sleeve of his shirt.

"Know what else I like?" he murmured as they walked back.

DG just made a questioning noise into his shoulder.

"That talking about bedding you still makes you blush."

He grunted mild amusement when she punched him in the ribs with her free hand.

* * *

"Wait."

She paused but didn't turn.

She couldn't keep doing this.

She couldn't keep saying temporary goodbyes while hoping that they weren't about to become permanent ones.

"Wyatt…"

"Wait." He was suddenly tight pressed to her back and musky hot against her. "Just… wait."

"Don't." she shushed him abruptly, throat clenching emotion. "I can't - "

He crooned a quieting noise against her ear, knowing that Glitch and her father were both watching them from only steps away. He avoided the way they were pretending not to watch while at the same time noting every movement he made against her. She had more drones than a hornet Queen. He snorted a half laugh at the thought and lifted his fingers, closing his eyes as he pulled the ring from his left hand.

"Dorothy." He hushed her name into her hair, "Give me your hand."

She felt him reach against her fingers and tightly press into them, her palm closing against a jumbling mess of warm metals.

"I do love you, Princess." He gentled into her hair and kissed the back of her head. "I'll find you."

She moved to turn but he was already striding hard in the direction of her mother and sister, feet placing one hard in front of the other. His spine was straight and his shoulders were back. And she looked down at things that he'd left tightened safe in her hand. The life he'd left in her hand… Adora's ring, Jeb's horse, Jonah's star.

"Don't you say 'goodbye', Wyatt Cain." She snapped loudly from behind him.

He just cocked his hip at an angle, turning to walk backwards on steady feet.

She smiled sadly when he only offered a nod and a sweeping bow.

* * *

She could feel how tense and uneasy he was beside her, his body thrumming with nervous energy even as he stood perfectly still. His palm had settled somewhat comfortably on the jutting butt of his weapon, face passive but obviously tired. Azkadellia offered him a smile but realized that his attention was far from where she was standing beside him and focused on her sister, yards away from her.

"Take my hand." She asked of him quietly.

Wyatt sharply turned her a confused glance. "I don't - "

"You're connected to DG now, Captain." She lifted her hand up between them and kept it patiently open for him, "She's left light in you and I'll need whatever I can get."

He looked down at her open palm and remembered, faintly, that she'd once pointed out how he'd unconsciously flinched when DG's palm pressed hers. He swallowed and without another question let his hand settle with hers, eyes rising again to find the other sister. She was staring back at him from a distance, body cocked at an angle to him, her hand settled to her hip while she held the way he was looking at her. He didn't move as the Queen took up the space on the other side of Azkadellia.

"Captain Cain." She spoke quietly. "When we've done this and Dorothy is safe, I want you to make sure this daughter is your first priority. Understood?"

Az made a move to argue but he tightened his hand and interrupted it, "Yes, ma'am."

"Good." Lavender nodded. "Azkadellia?"

Az blew a heaved breath through her lips, "I don't know if this will work."

Cain gave her a sidelong sardonic smile, "What could possibly go wrong?"

* * *

She watched the storm start slow and lagging, biting against her bottom lip in concern when it fluttered and sputtered dead. DG frowned but then the sour look broke away when the twisting wind whipped back up a good ten yards to their left. Her father's hand slipped against hers and she grasped tightly back, panning a quiet look of nervous fear at him.

"Don't you remember me telling you not to be afraid of a storm?" he asked with a genuinely loving look, voice softening as though she were young. "It can't hurt you."

She shook her head, "It's not the storm. I don't know what I'm doing."

Her admission took him by gentle surprise and Ahamo tucked closer. She'd been so self assured and positive when speaking to her lover. He'd thought that she'd been perfectly complicit with the plan and how it moved her directly into safety. He suddenly understood that she was nervous to be alone… even if he was beside her. Ahamo ignored the pang of hurt he felt in his lungs and nodded, feeling the breaking edge of the high speed winds moving toward them.

"DG, you're doing what you need to do to keep peace in the O.Z."

She just nodded simply and looked for Cain again, realizing that the debris rucked up by the edge of the storm had already blocked him from her vision. "I hope so."

He bent his body at an angle, keeping his hand fast held in hers while his other arm looped her waist, supporting the dip of her body before she tipped forward. It was an awkward movement that very nearly reminded him of a waltz he'd been taught as a boy.

Wyatt cast a glance behind him toward where the storm was fast edging off in the opposite direction. Half of the large group was gone, a ragged group of around thirty soldiers still hanging back and waiting. He flinched when the Queen's body lurched forward and started to drop. His eyes slimmed uncomfortably as she went to her knees, but he didn't let go of Azkadellia, remembering the order he'd been precisely given not ten minutes before.

There was a certain difference in the way Az leaned against him, her longer and taller body leaning on him for support as she shivered. He felt her clench his hand in a suddenly harder grip, her breathing rapid and shuddering while her eyes started to slide closed. Time seemed to be taking too long and he nervously watched the both of them in concerned silence, the sudden quiet making him uneasy.

"A little farther, love." Lavender murmured, her voice bereft of energy and emotion, her hand still tensing around her daughter's.

"Are they - "

"Not yet." The Queen whispered exhaustedly. "Almost."

Wyatt tucked the young woman higher up against his chest, re-balancing her weight as her arms leveled against his shoulders. Her head dipped down against his right shoulder and he heard her lungs expel into a cough as her fingers flexed in his hand. He hushed her quietly and comfortingly before he looked down, catching the way Lavender nodded gently up at him.

She looked… like a tired mother.

For the first time in the ages and annuals that he had known her face as the price and poster of power…

She was only concerned and exhausted and pained for her children.

He suddenly respected the tightening of her hand in her oldest daughter's more than he'd ever respected the ruling fist of the Outer Zone.

"Good." He murmured and bent quick enough to cut his other arm up under the younger woman's legs, lifting her easily. "Let's go home."

* * *

He groaned and let his body tilt dizzily back onto the grass, head rebounding slightly off the soft ground. "That did not help."

"Shhh." His daughter's voice was a wave of comfort against him, her hands already pulling to help him sit up as she regained her balance from the storm. "You okay?"

"Eh." Ahamo shrugged and winced into the movement. "Sure."

"Can you walk the maze?" she asked as she pushed her hair back from her face, smiling thankfully up to where Darcy had moved in to help her lift him.

"Eh." Ahamo shrugged once again, catching his daughter's hand tightly. "Sure."

"I'll help." The young girl offered quietly, a nervous smile trapped up between the two of them.

DG studied the nervous clamor of the girl's face and nodded in appreciative consent. She did what she could to ease most of the weight bearing as she lifted him back into a crooked standing position. Her head dipped toward where the makeshift cane was a few feet away and watched in quiet pride as Darcy had already headed for it and plucked it up with quick hands. A smile lit her eyes as the girl offered it quietly to the Consort for support. Her hands both gripping his as he tested his weight against it.

"Looks like you're in good hands, sir." She gave the girl a smile and nodded her thanks, amused at the teenager's sudden blush.

"That was…rude." Glitch was rubbing the back of his head as he stepped into the group of them and DG gave him a compassionate look before laying her hand flat against his chest comfortingly.

"Az did what she could." She said gently, "Let me make sure everyone's okay and we'll take the last walk."

"Let Glitch do it." Ahamo murmured, his voice panning dark and heavy. "Go forward, Dorothy."

"I just want to - "

"I want you inside those gates." The sudden vehement force in her father's tone betrayed the pain that he was in, eyes flickering dark as he leaned more weight on the young girl than she'd expected.

DG turned a glance over the exhausted planes of his face and she stepped into his other side, nodding to the way Glitch took the cane away from him as the two women held most of the Consort's weight. Her arm looped hard against her father's spasming back and she frowned into the way his breathing winced and wheezed.

"Okay." She nodded and leaned him into a step, watching his stripped-pale face with a held breath. "Slowly."

* * *

Raw watched the boy finally dip into a tearful sleep, gently wiping at the wetness that was still covering his young cheeks. His fingers rubbed softly, feather-light as he studied the innocent look of comfort on the child's face. He'd been so upset, so hurt that his new friend had left him. She'd been another in a line of recent disappearances that left Kalm feeling even more alone.

He wiped at the child's hair and reached out to them, concerned when he couldn't necessarily track a single one of them…

They were either too far away, too close to Finaqua, or they were gone.

* * *

"It doesn't matter." Azkadellia's voice was a slur of half sleep and awkward rambling, "It doesn't matter what I do."

Wyatt shifted awkwardly on the mare, letting her relax farther back into his chest as he cast a concerned glance toward the Queen. Lavender just smiled weakly and waved it off as the exhausted and misplaced mutterings of a magically spent girl. He turned his eyes back toward the imaginary line that led them to Finaqua, making a hushing noise in his throat. The soldiers that surrounded them were now familiar to him but he intentionally avoided their curious glances.

"It doesn't." she shook her head and curled tighter into him as a child would during the waking of a nightmare. "I could save them all."

"It matters to me." He responded quietly and ignored the warning glance Lavender gave him at his placation as she kept her horse at a steady gait.

"You're an exception." Az put both her hands against the way he was holding the reins of the horse in front of her. "You don't hate."

"I do." He argued quietly, voice bereft. "I still do."

"You don't." she breathed sleepily into his neck, her voice already fading. "Dorothy won't let you anymore."

Cain angled his head down to try and see the set of her face, "Your sister doesn't stop me from feeling anything. Quite the opposite, in fact."

"My sister," her words were muzzling low and quiet, "stops entire worlds from moving."

He couldn't help the smirk that tweaked his lips. "Go to sleep, Az."

"No." she shook her head against him in dizzied frustration, "You know it's true."

"You're talkin' gibberish."

Azkadellia's eyes, when she finally lifted her head, were a more vibrant and verdant green than he'd ever seen them spark before, "You know it's true."

Wyatt nodded and hugged her closer, "I know."

"Wyatt?" her fingers lifted dazed to touch his face and the movement felt eerily strange and fittingly uncomfortable. "You know that you'll die in front of her, don't you?"

The air was thicker than he remembered it being since he'd been caged in.

He flinched but kept looking forward, breathing stunted and silently imagining that he could see the maze of Finaqua in the loss of day's light. "I know."

"She'll fall from everything right after." Az breathed slowly as she curled back into his chest. "She'll dive into the fall."

"Go to sleep, Az." He repeated quietly, this time with a sad glaze on bright blue eyes.

"It's a long echo but I can tell you when." Her words were muzzling into much needed sleep. "If you really want to know."

"Thank you." He just tucked her even closer, hushing her with a soft sound from his throat, "But I do not."


	18. Chapter 18

She'd made the maze without really knowing what direction or why. And it had been surprised exhaustion on her face when the group of them had been met by a handful of faintly familiar servants at the gate. Ahamo had spoken to some of them with a weakened smile, but DG still hadn't trusted a single one of them. She'd asked Glitch to have the remaining Viewers read every one of the supposed resistance members that had returned to Finaqua at the news of the Witch's death. And in the meantime, she'd only placed her trust in a small-framed, little blonde girl.

"Thank you, Darcy." She said gently, opening the door from the room they had left her father to rest in. "I appreciate it."

"You're welcome, Princess." There was a flick of undeniable pride on the girl's face, her brown eyes suddenly a warm chocolate color. "I like him. He's funny."

DG let a laugh through her nose and nodded, shutting the door slowly with one last glance behind. Ahamo was laid back on the nearest bed they had located, his shaking hands now rubbing over and covering his face as he relaxed his body. Her hands stayed still against the door a moment after she'd closed it. With a motion to the two soldiers she'd requested, she stepped away from the door, watching them move toward it.

"Until the Queen arrives this young lady is the only other person besides me allowed in that room." She glanced between the two of them. "Is that understood?"

They both cocked disbelieving glances toward the girl but made their faces passive and agreeable as they nodded to her. DG questioned her own decision for a moment, eyes falling over the child. She knew that, possibly, it could be a mistake… That, possibly, like Jonah… she could be under the control of someone else. Her hand lifted and she paused mere inches from touching the girl, her intentions stunted. Her breathing held a moment and she did what she could to find trust in the girl.

"I won't hurt him." Darcy murmured, too smart for her own good, following behind as the older woman started to walk away.

DG nodded in apology. "I know that now."

"Are you going to be Queen?" Darcy's eyes were questioning as she sped to even her steps with the brunette's. "I mean now?"

"I don't know." DG admitted softly. "Soon, I think."

The girl's face softened, eyes going lighter. "Can I stay here when you are?"

"Of course." DG whispered and touched her hand. "I wouldn't make you leave."

Darcy smiled back at her, "I know that now."

* * *

Lavender let her horse idle beside his slowly. "I'm sorry that you didn't get to spend this time with your son."

Cain sharply looked over Azkadellia's bent head, "He understands."

"I know that he does." The Queen gentled. "That doesn't mean that it doesn't hurt the both of you to still be apart."

"We'll find a way." Cain murmured, eyes turning back up to where he'd seen the lit spires of Finaqua a few moments before. His chest had warmed with comfort, knowing that the very lights that danced in front of him were a guileless welcome.

"I trusted him." Lavender continued. "Because he is his father's son. I had to leave him behind."

Wyatt shrugged as much as he could with the Princess cuddled sleeping in from of him on the saddle, "He made his own decision, your Majesty – and I wasn't about to stand in his way. He's a grown man."

"Dorothy is a grown woman." The woman's voice was not as accusatory as he'd expected it would be when they finally broached this subject. "I know that… I can't… It doesn't mean that I am not concerned. You, of all people, should understand that."

"I do." He allowed softly, catching the way the tired soldiers were perking at the sound of their mingled voices. "And I wouldn't expect any less."

"Captain," her tone lowered farther until he could barely hear her. "She's more than just the next in line. She's…"

"Stubborn." He offered a humored tone to gentle the conversation.

"Precocious, warm, affectionate, prone to trouble, generous, intelligent, strong-willed…" Lavender rattled the list off with her own dose of good humor. "You'll find that the more you push her, the more she pushes back."

"I know." He nodded in agreement. "I do."

Her voice aimed back toward the tone of a stern mother, "She is very precious to me, Captain. Regardless of what you may think of me for sending her away… I did it to save her."

He turned to her in the darkness, eyes drawing from the lights that glittered beyond the maze. "I know."

"We make choices as parents that we cannot undo." She said gently. "And they haunt us as we watch our children deal with the ramifications."

He thought of Zero's hand coming down hard on the face of his young son years before.

"DG doesn't blame you." He softly told her. "Not really. Abandonment issues aside, she's smart enough to understand why these things had to happen."

Lavender just nodded into the darkness, "The Queen in me understands that. The mother…"

Cain just let her go silent into the last of the ride.

* * *

She tried to ignore the fact that Glitch wouldn't leave the outer room of the small bedroom she'd staked a claim on. It was mildly amusing, but also slightly annoying. DG swallowed the frustration and instead barred herself into the bathroom that adjoined it, scraping the heavy wooden chair that had been placed in the corner in front of the delicate handle. Her hands set to her hips before she turned and caught her own disconcerting reflection in the mirror.

She was stained and battered and looking far older than she ever remembered the mirrors showing back home… Her hair was a dark tangled mess of now frazzled curls, face grimed with grit and dirt and blood and sweat. His blood. His blood was still stark against pale. The blue of her eyes was the only other stanchion of color on her washed out, washed away face. The shirt that Az had laughingly tied against her was now mud-tracked and-blood laced. One of her hands curved against her stomach as she stared at herself in the mirror, face paling farther as she stepped toward it.

It wasn't just age or weariness.

It was desperation on the planes of her face.

"Follow through." She whispered quietly, eyes sliding closed as she started unlacing the shirt, letting the emerald tip into her palm. "Follow through, Tin Man."

She stripped the rest of the clothing from her battered body, bending to run the hottest sweet water bath she could manage before reaching back for the swampy and musky clothing. Her fingers easily loosed every piece of metal he'd handed her from secret pockets and folds, laying them loose beside the emerald across the spread of the marble dressing table. After dropping the clothes back into a ragged heap she reached up to remove the locket that she was still wearing around her neck, letting the chain lay it in a tangle at the end of the line. A precious stone, a horse, a ring, a star, a locket and a straight razor.

They were all correct in her mind, but… in the wrong places. Or maybe not.

The emerald and ring and locket.

The horse and razor and star.

She shifted them thoughtlessly and unknowingly into two groups, Jeb's horse at the head of two newly formed lines.

"Three and three." She whispered quietly, not quite understanding the rippled thought that made its way through her addled brain.

DG groaned weary frustration and stepped naked away from them, hissing aching pain as she finally let her body dip and relax into steaming hot water.

* * *

"You look…" Ahamo breathed slow into the center of the sentence. "Gorgeous."

"Az will be pleased." DG rolled her eyes and fussed her hand against her stomach, the deep green of the only simple dress she had found making her hair seem darker. "After she laughs her head off."

He just smiled and patted a flat palm to the side of the bed he was stretched out on, letting his head lag back onto the headboard as she moved close and sat gently against the mattress. Her eyes were an unfocused palette of blues and she didn't seem to notice the way he was staring at her with warm pride. DG lifted her hand and set it gently, cautiously on top of his.

"You smell better." She smiled up at him, feigning happiness as she squeezed his freshly scrubbed hand. "You should be sleeping."

"I'm not sleeping until your mother's next to me." His tone nearly sounded like that of a petulant child.

DG's face went light and pale again as she looked toward the darkened window. She smiled as she caught sight of the girl that was curled sleeping in the chair in the corner. Her hand squeezed his as she cocked her head toward Darcy. Ahamo just shrugged a silent laugh at her and lifted the other hand questioningly.

"Kid needs a bath." She said gently.

"She needs to sleep more." He answered just as softly.

"She thinks you're funny." DG panned a disbelieving glance toward him. "She obviously has a really crappy sense of humor."

Ahamo just chuckled and tucked his daughter's hand into both of his, "Obviously."

* * *

"C'mon, Az." He slowly and gently nudged her awake. "You'll wanna see this."

She wiped a hand at her face and jolted as she started to lose her balance, body aching from the rolling gait of the horse and the awkward position she'd fallen asleep in. His hands kept her from tipping too far and she caught against the reins that he was gripping against her stomach, head lifting to find lights bright in front of them. The swell of the large maze broke between them but she smiled into the way they played a twinkling dance for her. The mare shifted uneasily and she squeezed his hand.

"Let me down."

"Az - "

"Let me down, Captain." She ordered again as she started easing off the horse.

Wyatt aimed his hands to help her down, watching the careful way she slowly set her feet to the ground before glancing back up to the entrance of the maze. One of her hands tried to brush the hair from her face and he smirked at how much she suddenly reminded him of her younger sister. His body threw an ache into his limbs as he shifted, leaning himself off the horse. His eyes turned back up to the lights that were half welcoming, half taunting him. His shoulders were tight and his body ached hard… but he hadn't been this excited or comforted in days.

"Azkadellia." The Queen's voice was full and lush behind them, "Lead these men home, please."

The older daughter didn't look back to her mother, instead stepping confidently and quickly into the mouth of the maze.

* * *

She was shaking her head in laughter, pulling a brush slow and easy through her hair as Darcy cooed a pleased noise at the clothing she'd laid out. DG watched the teenager lifted the dress easily and warmly, excited brown eyes flicking toward her in pleasure. It was as though she didn't believe in gifts anymore and the very idea saddened DG.

"You can have it, once you're cleaned up." She nodded to the blonde.

The girl laid it back to the bed carefully, suddenly aware of how grubby and stained her fingers were. She simply leaned over it then, studying the embroidery that laced the top edging. DG set the brush down and moved into the bathroom, stepping toward the tub to run the hot water once again… She paused though.

While the emerald was tucked back safe against her skin, the other items she'd left loose upon the dressing table and her eyes fell to them.

"Darcy." She called the girl in and aimed a hand toward them.

The teenager leaned her body into the doorframe, dark eyes following the older woman's hand. "They're glowing."

"I was…" DG shook her head, "I was making sure you saw it too."

"Green. They're glowing green" The young girl cocked her head. "What does it mean?"

DG felt the smile twitch her lips unwarranted as her stomach turned over hot. "It means they're home."

"They're here?"

She just nodded, already heading toward the door. "Please find Glitch for me."

* * *

He dropped the saddle hard to the dirt, exhaling a long and dazed breath as the mare shifted beside him. He smoothed his palm to her shoulder and looked over the white of her in the lamp and firelight, smiling as he reached to pull the bridle off her, fingers itching to move quickly.

"Wyatt." Az's voice was soft beside him. "Look."

"I know she's there." He grinned into the relaxed words as he loosened the bridle, pulling it off slow before turning.

He let his fingers drop it into a careless heap on the ground, eyes lifted to where a nearly unrecognizable but perfectly gorgeous woman was standing halfway down the steps of the main gate. Her hands had settled cleanly to her slim hips and he quietly studied the way the dark dress she'd found somewhere hugged tight to her hips and curved warmly against her breasts. He lifted a hand to tug his hat off, the other wiping at the gritty sweat on his face as he took a step forward. With a grin he gave forward a half bow, shoulders bending forward while his head stayed up. Wyatt grinned when she shook her head and started quick tumbling steps down the last of the stairs.

"Don't you dare fall down." He admonished, laughing when she sped into him. "I've been covering your ass too long for you to - "

The rest of his pointed comment huffed hard from his lungs as she lunged into his chest, forcing him to catch her petite and speedy body as she launched herself up into him. Wyatt laughed his face into her hair, sighing out as she made an excited noise into his shoulder. Her arms wrapped tight about his neck and he curled and closed happily around her.

He groaned leisurely and lifted the still marked palm to the back of her head while walking them into a lazily swinging circle, rubbing at the soft and silky waves of dark while her legs tightened at his hips. His other hand cupped under her to keep her small frame up warm and close. He swallowed in the fresh scrubbed smell of her, heat and water and violets perfuming his lungs.

"I told you I'd find you."

"You cheated." She kissed his cheek as she lifted her head. "You had Az do it."

"That is not entirely true. And I'm still here." He murmured and laid a light kiss onto her lips. "You smell delicious. You smell like home."

"You stink." She cockily answered before laying her head sidelong to his. "But I forgive you."

"You look delicious too." He kissed her ear through a haze of soft dark tresses. "Do I have to carry you back inside? Cuz I'm pretty tired."

DG shrugged with a knowing grin and loosened her hold on him, letting her legs slide back to the ground so that she could stand and hug into his chest. Her head tipped and she passed an apologetic glance to the way her sister was watching quietly. Az rolled her eyes and waved it off, tiredly putting out a hand as DG stepped away from him and into a gripping hug. She noted her mother a step away and reached a hand behind her sister, drawing the older woman toward them. Lavender put her hands against the both of them and leaned her face between them, letting her girls close her in.

Wyatt rubbed his hand against his heavily stubbled jaw, thumb wiping his bottom lip idly as he watched the three of them start talking excitedly at once. He grinned at the rhythmic matching of their tones and turned toward where a washed and warmed Glitch was moving toward him. The two men smirked at each other before leaning in for a brief but affectionate hug. Wyatt rubbed against the other man's good shoulder before exhaling hard.

"You're exhausted. We're all exhausted." Glitch nodded. "We should go inside."

Cain nodded, "In a minute."

"She's happy." The darker of the two murmured quietly, rubbing against his injured arm while watching DG laugh with her sister.

Wyatt breathed into a nod. "She should be."

* * *

"The remaining servants have all been screened by the Viewers. Some men have been posted and others are resting or receiving medical attention" DG was rattling the words off easily as they moved quickly down the hall, "I have Glitch working on communications between here and Central City. Two scouts will leave for Tribal Grounds in the morning and I have food and baths set ready for all of you."

"I want to see your father first." Lavender said with subtle intensity and DG nodded, already leading her toward the door she'd left him behind with an open hand.

She smirked easily when she saw a still sopping wet Darcy waiting outside the door with an expectant and nervous look mingling on her pale face, the two silent sentries still on either side. DG nodded a grin and her and reached up, wiping the water droplets from the girl's cheekbone, winking as she tipped her head to the side.

"He knows you're back, ma'am." Darcy directed at her mother, both hands wiping at her damp hair as she stepped to the side. "I tried to get him to eat earlier but he refused."

Lavender quirked an amused glance over the girl and nodded her appreciation, "Thank you…"

"Darcy." DG supplied softly.

"Darcy." Lavender repeated and set her hand to the door handle, turning it easily.

DG stepped farther back from the door with a hand at the girl's elbow, her eyes following the slow and easy way her mother stepped into the room and shut the door quietly behind her. She released a slow and evened breath, shoulders relaxing from their tensed position.

"She makes me so…"

"Nervous?" DG grinned and let her arm tuck against the girl's back. "Welcome to my life."

* * *

She knocked softly on the open door, leaning into the frame with a cautious glance inside. Her older sister was sitting still and awkward on the edge of a hastily made bed, her hands folded neatly and yet oddly in her lap. DG realized that her sister had ignored the sound but stepped slowly into the room anyhow. She leaned forward and knelt, feeling the way her body ached weary as she angled to the floor. Her hands pressed smoothly over her sister's.

"Sleep, food, or a bath, Big Sister." She whispered up softly. "Which one is first?"

"I can't eat." Az shook her head. "I don't want to eat."

"Okay." DG nodded supportively, unnerved that Az still wouldn't meet her eyes with a full glance. "How about we get you cleaned up and - "

"I can do it myself, Deeg." Azkadellia whispered and finally looked up. "I'm fine."

"You're not fine." The younger woman whispered as she held her sister's darkening glance. "You're scaring me."

Az smiled tiredly and lifted a finger to rub down the line of DG's nose. "I appreciate it, sweetheart. I can bathe by myself."

"I'm not going anywhere."

"You are." Azkadellia cocked her head at an angle and nodded. "You have someone waiting for you."

"He's waited patiently before." DG murmured gently, "He can wait a little longer."

Az smiled over her younger sister and twined dark hair in her fingers, "It's your life, DG. Enjoy it now."


	19. Chapter 19

She couldn't help the pleased moan she laid out through the bathroom doorway, a hand rubbing her own shoulder while she tipped her head to look over the wet line of his back. Wyatt grinned at the sound she made, tightening the towel that he was looping around his waist. He smiled up at her in the low lamplight, reaching up to wipe at the water that was trickling down the back of his neck.

"How's Az?" he asked gently, the breaks of his palms leaning onto the dressing table as he finally looked over the cuts and bruises that marked and mottled his pale face.

DG shrugged and moved into the small bathroom, easing to his side so that she could lean back against the lip of the counter. Her fingers lifted to tease at the towel and then tiptoe up his chest while he rubbed against the stubble on his jaw again, annoyed with it after days. His eyes drifted warm over the way she was studying his face before looking down to where the straight razor was laying beside a polyglot of other items. He reached for it but abruptly stopped halfway.

"Where's the emerald?"

DG just smirked at him, jaw lifting in challenge. "Where you left it."

Wyatt leaned into her, kissing her slow and long to distract from his fingers sliding down the front of her dress. Her laughter tripped over his lips as he pulled it away from her, his kisses littering her jaw before he pulled back and dropped it beside the other items. He was still smiling as he looked down but his face slowly fell passive. She interestedly watched his forehead knit as he stared over them.

"You notice it too." She leaned farther forward and into his side, her voice pleased and hand resting on his bare and damp shoulder while she kissed the inner curve of his neck.

Wyatt frowned over the items while his hand tucked her tighter, "I don't… I don't get it though."

DG turned a hand back as she angled her body between his and the table, letting him ride his hips up tight behind hers as he looped his arms around her waist. His fingers were rubbing smooth and slow just below her breasts, chin tipping her shoulder as he watched her place the pieces into two groups. Wyatt started laying kisses against where the hem of the dress met the soft skin of her shoulder, eyes following the slow movements of her fingers.

"I don't get it either." She turned her face toward his. "But…"

"Three and three." He murmured onto her skin as she re-aligned the groups.

"Exactly." She nodded and looked over his face. "What does it mean?"

His left hand left her and reached forward, tapping Jeb's horse as he smirked. "Starting with Jeb. The horse, razor, star…three boys. Emerald, locket, ring. Three girls."

DG's face paled and her eyes went bright and clear. "I… Wyatt."

He just chuckled and kissed light against her temple. "Don't read all that much into it, Princess. Earlier your sister was telling me death tales while drifting off to Dreamland."

He started to pull away but she gripped his arm against her stomach, fingers prying into his skin nervously. "Wyatt."

"Every prophecy is self fulfilling, DG." He spoke softly. "It could be anything. It could be the next group of royal advisors. It could be six specific people for one specific event. You're not gonna know until - "

"Wyatt." She cast him a darkening glance.

He just let his face drop onto her shoulder, "It could be anything. Stop letting your family's knack for crazy twist your head up."

"It could mean - "

"I know what it could mean." He rubbed his nose into her hair. "It could be a list of births. It could be a list of deaths. It could be anything, Dorothy. Please stop worrying and remember the fact that I'm completely naked under this towel."

DG smiled into the giddy pleading that laced his tired tones, "Completely?"

"Entirely."

* * *

The last hour before he slept was a blur of happy laughter and the smell, taste, touch, air of her over-on-under-in him. His lungs were burning from the heat of her swallowing the oxygen from all his breathing kisses and he found himself happily letting her exhaust him completely before tipping his head on her shoulder wearily. His arms finally collapsed with the weight of fatigue, his body laying heavily on top of hers while she curled her arms at his shoulders. He fell asleep easy, far too easy, with the slow circular rub of her fingertips on his scalp and her hushed murmurings crowning in his hair.

He dreamed with her, at least he thought that's what it was… a dream.

He wasn't sure what it was, but she was humming a slow song to lull him…

* * *

She sifted her fingers through his now too-long hair, letting her chin rub into the way he'd tucked his head against her collarbone and his hand against her stomach. Lavender smiled at the fussing way he shifted tighter to her in his sleep, eyes flinching at whatever dream he was lingering in. Her other hand lifted to soothe against his cheek and she studied the way age had altered the face that she still remembered from…annuals before. The way he'd smiled at her excitedly the first time they'd met. Too cocky, too brash, but romantically weak-willed and easily won over. Ahamo had never been one to deny her much when he sensed that she needed or wanted something…

He'd cried when Azkadellia had been born.

He'd cried harder when Dorothy had been born.

But, to his credit, he hadn't cried when they'd had to separate.

He'd been stern, strong, supportive… everything she had needed him to be.

She let her head lay against the top of his, breathing slowly as he groaned pain from his lungs as he slept. Her palm laid cool and gentle against his hip and she did what she could to at least dull the pain that was crippling him. She hated that she couldn't do more but without the emerald… with a failing hand of power… Her youngest daughter was surely up to the challenge but that didn't mean that she was mentally prepared to grasp hold of a kingdom, let alone deal with advisors and councils and soldiers and legal disputes.

"Stop thinking so much." His voice grumbled rough and raspy against her throat. "You're waking me up."

"Dorothy isn't necessarily ready." She whispered back and let her hand rub against his hipbone, "And Azkadellia is in no shape to help her."

"We'll sort it out, Lavender."

It wasn't often that he used her first name so softly.

It stilled her enough that she took a calming breath and gave him a smile. "I know."

"The law, as it's written," he allowed, "dictates enough transition time for you to settle this unrest before publicly naming her. Let alone handing over the throne. The five of us are the only ones who know that she has the stone. We're the only ones that know that power has shifted."

"She has so much to learn." Lavender intentionally eased her body lower, letting him shift with her so that they were curled into each other. "And she was never one to sit still and be educated."

Ahamo laughed softly and kissed her with an easy smile, "She gets that from - "

"From you." She'd hushed him with a finger to his lips. "Don't deny it."

He just grinned at her in acquiescence.

* * *

Glitch winced as he thoughtlessly tried to use his still aching arm, face contorting and curses rebounding off his lips as he stepped away from the communications terminal. His foot literally stomped the ground and he heard laughter fall into the room from the doorway, causing him to jump in uneasy surprise.

"I'm sorry." It was the young girl that DG had been helping along. "I didn't mean to laugh. I'm sorry."

"It's okay. People laugh at me all the time." He shrugged, noting that the same flicker of excited amusement he'd recognized on the soon-to-be Queen was glinting in the teenager's brown eyes. "You can come in."

Darcy grinned at him, her wide eyes showing brighter excitement as she leaned in beside him, glance raking over the wiring that he was working with. Her fingers stretched out to play over the pieces and parts before she looked back up at him.

"Need help?"

"I could use another hand." He wiggled the fingers of his injured arm from inside the sling.

Darcy grinned wide, "What do you need me to do?"

"Exactly what I tell you to do." His tone was just as excited as hers as he launched into an explanation of the machine that really made no sense to her at all.

Still… it made her happy to listen.

* * *

She settled comfortably warm into the scented and soothing bath, head dipping back against the tub as she let her limbs loosen. Her eyes closed and for a moment she considered opening them again but instead just let the images roll through her thoughts. Forward images, backwards ones. Easy to see and read, some fuzzed and blurry in her head… She was tired. There was no blocking it.

Trying to focus on one memory, she wiped a now wet hand against her face.

She smiled at the thought of her sister looking annoyed in that damn beautiful dress.

And then she laughed and held that happiness as long as she could.

* * *

"Stop." DG forced a roughing tone into her voice. "Wyatt, stop."

His eyes were a nearly clear flared blue when they snapped open, face a reddened burn of fear as he studied the way she was leaned tentatively over him. It took him a moment to realize that her wrist was wound tight in a reflexively curling palm and he forced his hand to loosen, turning his head away from her in the darkness of the bedroom. He dropped the offending hand to the mattress and squeezed his eyes shut. DG ignored his embarrassed flush and leaned against his chest, her face closer to his than he thought it probably should be considering the circumstances of his waking.

"Sorry." He rasped the whisper into the room.

"Don't." she kissed his shoulder, lips lazily rubbing the scars that marred it. "Don't be. It was a nightmare."

"Az… she…" he shied his jaw farther away from her in the dark.

"She what?" DG asked quietly, spreading up against his chest in a way that forced him to shift his hips under the movement of hers.

Wyatt looked up into the full dark of the room, catching the way the lights that flared outside the windows haloed her hair as she straddled his hips and leaned over him, her hands rubbing and soothing his shoulders. He considered the angles of her waist and breasts and shoulders before sitting up, growling his teeth and tongue against her throat as she shifted lower into his lap.

"She what?" she repeated, her nails making delightful little nips down the center of his chest, "Tell me, Captain."

"The two of you and your fairy tale fantasies." His hands gripped at her hips as he lifted his chest closer to hers. "Prophesies and omens and a mess of silly - "

"What did she tell you?" DG asked again, lowering her tone farther while she rolled her hips against him, grinning victory when he groaned and let his mouth angle down against her breasts.

"She offered to tell me when I'm going to die." His tongue tested against her nipple before he closed his mouth against it.

DG arched her back, driving down against him while she cupped her hands against his head, sighing into the movement of his mouth. Her chin dropped so that she could kiss against the top of his head, fingers teasing his flushed ears. She felt his hands lifted against her again and she smiled her eyes closed as one of his hands shifted to slide between her thighs. He rubbed slow into wetness, teeth scraping her nipple before he lifted his head back to her.

"And?"

"I told her 'no, thank you'." He grumbled at her, his voice hushing as he rubbed against her clit.

DG's hips jerked against his hand when he slid a finger inside her, letting his thumb keep working at her in a slow rhythmic motion. He watched her head drop back slowly, hair a gorgeous messy wave of darkness as she bared her reddened neck. He considered laying his mouth there again but continued watching her as her hips rolled instead. He worked his fingers slow but steady, in and out of her while his thumb kept a circular motion. Her breasts arched closer to him with every aching moan she breathed out of increasingly rapid exhalations.

"Three and three." He was working her harder, the rhythm incrementally faster but still slower than she'd like. "Tell me what it means."

"I don't know." She shook her head and looked down over him. "Stop teasing me, Wyatt."

"Tell me, Princess." He angled two fingers as deep inside her as he could and stilled them, thumb slowly tapping at her clit as she let off a frustrated whimper and glared at him.

"It's not three and three." She pushed down against his hand but he refused to continue with a minute shake of his head. "It's two and one."

"I swear to both suns that you had better start making sense, pretty little Princess." He started drawing his fingers out of her and DG clenched against his shoulders and whimpered her forehead against his.

"No." her muscles clenched tight and wet around the tips of his fingers. "Don't."

"Tell me, Dorothy." He kissed the words to the corner of her mouth. "I'm not stupid."

Her face dropped to lay onto his shoulder, "You were right. Three boys, three girls."

"And?" he slowly teased his fingers back into her.

She moaned her mouth hot and open against his neck. "It's balance. Jeb, and Kalm and Darcy. They already make three but - "

"Two boys, one girl." He supplied and started his thumb back at a slow pattern on her clit, his other fingers drawing one of her smaller hands between them to his already hard length. "Which leaves two girls and a boy."

"My mother's power is fading, Wyatt." She shuddered into his chest as he started sliding his fingers in and out of her again. "You and I… Az. We're the middle balance."

"The older generation is losing so the younger generation - "

"Exactly." She closed her hand against him with a smile, tipping her hips and forcing him to pull his fingers from her so that she could slide down onto him, forcing his length deep into her.

He groaned into the wet heat of her as she curled her arms against his shoulders again, both his hands sliding up her back to support the way she was prized against him. One of his hands tangled in the tips of her dark hair while the other curved around and up under her breasts. Wyatt nipped at her bottom lip before noting the way she was smiling over him.

"I'm an old man, DG."

"Older." She corrected with a smug tone.

"Older." He kissed her lightly. "If you expect three - "

"Maybe not all three." She shook her head in cocky amusement. "And not for awhile. I promise."

"How do you know?" he could see the excited bright of blue in her eyes, even in the darkness.

"You told me while you were dreaming." She whispered the words onto his lips and ground down against him, jolting his hips up harder into her. "Do I have to do all this myself?"

He cocked her an annoyed glance and grunted before tugging her head back with a sudden flex of his hand in her hair. His mouth made a path down her throat as he thrust up into her, the other hand closing hard against her hip to spur her movements. DG let her hands loosen on his shoulders, palms flat against him as her weight leaned into the tensed and flexed muscle of his arm. He could see her white teeth digging down hard on her bottom lip and it made him groan as he pushed up harder. She made a pleased noise and let her nails scrape his sweated skin.

"Lay back." Her low and breathy voice was an order that he wasn't about to disregard, shoulders leaning back against the pillows as she held her own weight and his hands rubbed around against her stomach.

"Thought you wanted help." He let a little teasing into his tone and watched her lean down over him, her palms flush to his chest.

DG arched a brow at the smug smirk that was threading his thin lips and reached for the palm that had a fading glow, drawing it between them while she kept sliding up and down on his length. Her fingers aimed his deftly between them and he followed her urging to stroke her clit, feeling his own body start to shiver at an uncontrollable rate. Her shoulders arched back as he stroked against her, eyes following the curves of her and the angle of her neck as she rode him harder.

"Easy, baby." He whispered and flinched as she started clenching around him. "Don't rush."

"Wyatt." His other hand laid directly under her breasts in response, flat against her stomach so that she could grip against it with digging fingernails.

"Don't rush." He admonished again, keeping their rhythm quick and tight.

"Please?" her eyes dropped over him and the begging he found in the blue of them broke every stubborn resolve he thought he'd had.

His shoulders lifted again and he kissed her hard, sucking against her tongue as he increased speed and pressure, drawing her to come hard against him. She called out into his mouth as he shifted both his hands to her hips, sliding her into his own paced rhythm. He leaned his chest forward into hers, forcing her to arch as he drove the last of himself into her. It didn't take much, just her lips whispering his name into his mouth. He was fairly sure that he'd left bruises on her hips as he came but she didn't seem to mind as her hands both lifted to the sides of his face, soothing on his cheeks. She was shivering and when he could breathe again, he closed his arms tight against her waist, kissing slow and soothing on her stretched throat.

"Wiles." She smirked at him as she pressed her forehead against his to forcefully catch his glance. "Toldja that you couldn't tell me 'no'."

He groaned and rolled his eyes in supposed annoyance, carefully pulling her down as he laid back. "Why tell you 'no' when I'm getting exactly what I want?"

"See?" she smiled and nestled down into his chest, closing her thighs against his waist to keep him from separating them. "You're so logical. That's why I like you."

Cain sifted his fingers into her hair, trying to level his breathing. "I highly doubt that's the only reason you like me, Princess."

"Well," she clenched around his softening length. "not the only reason."

He let himself laugh into her hair and closed his eyes, breathing out hard as he relaxed his head into the pillow that smelled of her. He ignored the way his brain was playing over the words she'd said and instead just settled on the feeling of her fingers running up and down the side of his ribcage.

"Don't ask Azkadellia when it's gonna be." He lowered over her. "It'll only torture you."

"How do you know I'll even be alive?" she shrugged tighter into his chest.

He knew… He didn't know how. But he knew.

The same way she'd known the rest.

"Stop it." Her fingers lifted to stroke his face while she kept her head down. "Quiet, please."

Wyatt just nodded a smile and kissed her fingers softly while stroking her spine. "Yes, ma'am."


	20. Chapter 20

"Can we talk about this?" he was finger brushing through the full length of her dark hair, letting her relax lazily back into his chest while she moaned into the slow run of his fingers.

"Really?" DG dropped her head back onto his shoulder, voice drolling low. "You're still on this? You don't like silly fairy tale prophecy mumbo jumbo."

"I don't." he agreed and turned his head to look over her profile, amazed at how young and bright her face seemed in the half shadows. "I've also learned not to ignore you and your sister. Not when the both of you are - "

"Two little princesses." She aimed her face into his neck, eyes closed as she breathed a sigh out her nose. "We're still just two little princesses, Wyatt."

"Two girls." He kissed her forehead. "And a boy."

DG blinked her eyes back open, flaring bright and blue, "Yes, we are. The three of us. Last time I checked anyhow. Which was about twenty minutes ago."

"You know what I mean." His fingers lifted to run her cheek, noticing a bruise tipped into her hairline that he hadn't caught before. "I need you to… DG."

"At least two of them are yours." She kissed his jaw quickly, "Besides Jeb."

His face paled slightly but there was a smirk sliding into place on his lips, "Two?"

"Maybe three." She shrugged with a teasing smirk. "I can't tell exactly how many or when."

"And what Azkadellia said?"

DG frowned at the mention of it again and turned her face away from him, her hands rubbing against the way his bare thighs were pressed around her. "I don't see what Azkadellia sees. Not as much, I don't think. Or maybe it's just different."

"And you're not going to ask her." He leaned the words sidelong into her hair. "All right?"

DG just nodded, "Okay."

"DG." His tone was of flat voiced warning.

"I promise." She reached her fingers up and back, touching against his jaw and allowing him to kiss against them lightly.

"Guess I should probably marry you at some point." He heaved a taunting weariness into his voice, clutching her back tighter into his chest while he laid his lips to her bare shoulder.

"Excuse me?" her hand rubbed up to tweak at his short hair. "In this bed, who's royalty and who isn't?"

"Does it count if I've been very, very deep inside royal lines?" His voice had dropped a timbre as his hand aimed directly between her thighs.

"Wyatt!" she moved to slap at his leg and his other hand caught against her wrist as he laughed into her hair.

DG sighed happily into the way he wrapped both her arms up against her chest and let one hand stroke back against her thigh again while the other held her restrained.

"I'm not sure." She mocked an annoyed pout and dramatically blew a strand of hair from her face. "Maybe you should ask the Queen."

"Maybe I'll ask her when she agrees to marry me." The whisper of his words in her ear set more of a shiver on her than the easy stroke of a calloused palm.

"I am not the Queen." Her playful tone had instantly sobered.

"You are in practice if not in name, love." Cain drew his hand up against her stomach and pressed it there as a warm comfort. "You seem to be a proponent of fate, lately… You'd think that you would have wrestled that thought by now."

"I haven't." she shook her head negatively, eyes unfocused and forward. "Not entirely."

"I have faith in you." He murmured it quietly against the side of her head. "You know that?"

"That's why you won't let me leave this bed?" she turned a weak smile at him, winking past the worry that still darkened her eyes.

"I said faith." He smiled as his voice quieted, "Not ignorant trust that you'll do as you're told."

"You wouldn't like me half as much if I always did as told." She grinned at him before trying to scrabble up from the bed, laughing when he belatedly responded to the surprise movement and tugged her back onto the mattress, laughing into the warm span of her throat.

"You're right." He growled and nipped at her skin, forcing her lithe body under his with a smooth twist of his hips.

She let her eyes slide closed as his mouth traveled slowly down her chest, "I know."

* * *

"It's not quite that funny." Ahamo passed a half annoyed glance at his older daughter, rolling his eyes when she tipped into another roll of laughter.

"It is, a bit. Let them have some time." Az murmured and reached for the tea that one of the palace servants had brought them. "They'll come down when they're ready."

"I really don't need to discuss it further, Az." He pushed a cup closer as she poured for the both of them. "Neither of my daughters have ever grown up."

"We're both still perfect little princesses in party dresses." She nodded and set the dented kettle back to the table and lifted her cup. "Playing tea party with Papa."

"Exactly." He smiled at her and lifted his own, letting it touch gentle to hers before taking a slow sip of the steaming liquid. "And never shall it alter."

Az smiled at the way he was studying her face and looked into the cup, leaning her shoulders back into the chair that she faintly remembered being one of her favorites from childhood. She let her head lift as she searched the still dusty library they'd sought refuge in. His legs were still raised up on another one of the stuffed and recently uncovered chairs, his shoulders leaned back carefully as he rested his back.

"I like him." Azkadellia said gently. "He isn't frightened off by what she's facing. He doesn't allow her to pity herself. Nor is he afraid to confront her when she's acting without thinking first."

"I like him." Ahamo shrugged and settled farther into the chair. "I just don't like thinking about him too much."

Azkadellia smirked, "He isn't going anywhere."

Her father nodded with huffed laughter, "That's exactly why I'm not too keen on thinking about him too much."

* * *

"Dorothy," Az tapped her knuckles against the door once again. "I mean it this time."

She shook her head and leaned off the frame of the door, moving to step away from it before she heard the valved click of the lock and the hushing movement of the door. Cain leaned his hand against the frame, letting the side of his head press easily to his knuckles with a flushed smirk. There was nearly embarrassed apology in his clear lightened eyes but when he saw the arched brow she was giving him he grinned reflexively. The width of the smile made his eyes look suddenly younger.

"You're quite incorrigible, aren't you Captain?"

Wyatt smirked even wider and rubbed at his jaw, "DG's getting cleaned up. She'll be down in a few minutes. I promise, Princess."

"I brought clean pants and a shirt for her." Az lifted the clothing. "I don't want to hear any more whining about the dress."

He took them with an appreciative smile, "I, uh…"

"You need clean clothes too?" she guessed at the way he was smiling at her again.

His broad grin was response enough.

"Give me ten minutes." Her hand lifted idly between them. "And then you need to join the guard with my mother."

His face flickered confusion. "She's meeting with the guard already?"

"She wasn't inclined to wait for you, Captain." It was her turn to grin at the nervous cast of his face.

* * *

"I'm sorry." She rushed the words out easily, rubbing a hand against Glitch's back as she moved in beside him. "Sorry."

Glitch shrugged, "Cain just left. You're a step behind this morning."

"I was checking in on my father." She nodded.

The smile her friend gave her dazzled as he just gave her a wink and aimed a hand toward the communications panel that he'd been working on. DG moved toward it, running her fingers against the lower edge of the casing, frowning over the way the reception on the screen just ran fuzzy with static. The blue cast of it unnerved her slightly and she looked back toward Glitch.

"It's not connected on the other end?"

"Not yet." He shifted up beside her, letting his good hand lean against the desk framing carefully, "But our end is ready whenever."

"C'mon, Jeb." She tapped two fingers against the screen. "Give us a jingle."

* * *

Lavender rubbed her fingers into her forehead, already starting to lose patience and lack attention as the lead soldiers that Cain had appointed as leads reported to her. She sucked in a balancing breath and opened her mouth to speak out of frustration, stopping suddenly when he slid in the door quietly, shutting it with a palm to the now warped wood. Lavender nodded back as he dipped his head in apology and aimed her hand toward the empty chair that she'd left directly across from her.

"My apologies, your Majesty." His hand trailed the edge of the table before he sat gentle to the empty chair. "I was checking in with Glitch on his progress."

"The communications panel? She asked gently.

Cain nodded, "He's got it wired and running on our end. Apparently the distortion on the other end is fouling things up. He's running on the assumption that they haven't gotten their system going yet."

"They've had plenty of time." Lavender leaned nervously back from the table and waved toward the coffee carafe that was in the center of the table. "Should we be worried?"

"I honestly don't know if anyone on the other end can fix it as quickly as Glitch can." He shrugged, leaning his shoulders back comfortably in the crisp white shirt and tight black vest that Az had supplied him with. "It's his handiwork."

"We can decide what to do about that later." She said gently, "I want to talk about protection."

Wyatt nodded cleanly, "So do I."

"I'd like to see protection details for both the girls as a first priority."

He inclined his head again. "So would I."

"I'd also like to close the ranks of the guard in a little." She said gently. "Re-assess our assets and create a tighter chain of command."

He ignored the way that every one of the soldiers at the table eyed him hopefully. "I'll need a little time to look into it."

Lavender nodded at him and he was surprised to see that there was almost a smile tripping her lips. "I trust your judgment, Captain."

He resisted the urge to smirk back at her, realizing that she'd noticed the shifting of the men around them as well. They seemed a little straighter in their chairs, shoulders back a bit broader. He tamed the smile on his lips and leaned back amiably, sipping at the coffee she'd offered before nodding again.

"We'll meet again over dinner." As she leaned to stand, so did he.

And the both of them shared an almost laugh across the long table at the excitable way every young man jerked their body to match her movements.

"Thank you, Captain."

He bit down against a grin, letting his shoulders dip slightly, "Your majesty."

* * *

"You're hiding." Azkadellia's voice was a warm addition to the chuffed noises the horses were making as they moved about their stable pens.

DG shrugged and continued stroking up and down Jefferson's long nose, cooing a quieting noise to him as he nervously eyed the way her sister moved closer. She focused on the horse and the way he dipped his head back to her, nosing against her hand to urge her continued scratches against his nose.

"They don't seem to need me at the moment." She spoke quietly, the smell of fresh straw was a clean comfort and she let her head lean into the horse's neck. "I'm just thinking."

"Thinking about?" Az offered a few slices of apple that she'd brought to the Pinto and he was suddenly very friendly with the older woman.

DG shrugged once again. "A lot of things. We're meeting over dinner?"

"Mmmm." Az nodded and laughed as the horse sniffed at her, searching for more treats with a nudging motion. "Father's reading up on the legality issues involved in naming you heir while - "

"That's… that's it." DG crossed her arms over the pale blue of the shirt her sister had found somewhere within the rejuvenating palace. "I don't understand why it has to be so fast. It's not going to help the Zone to have such a sudden change in power."

"It won't be sudden, DG." Az said gently. "They're not planning to just throw you into it. It'll be months of training, learning, taking control of the politics of the kingdom."

"Forgive me if I'm not all that excited." The younger of the two bent her elbows against the rail that separated her from her horse. "It's unsettling."

"It's not common knowledge that you have the emerald, Deeg." Her sister hushed her tone, "And we're not going to dump everything on you. I just… I can't do it. I'm sorry."

DG caught the flicker of emotion in her sister's voice and cast a glance over her shoulder, noticing the sadness in Azkadellia's eyes as she rubbed Jefferson's ears to keep occupied. She turned and leaned back into the rail, elbows resting back on it while she studied her sister quietly.

"Tell me when it's going to happen." She said very softly. "Please?"

Azkadellia looked at her sharply and started at the pale of her younger sister's face. Her eyes slimmed and both her hands slid down to her hips as they shared a fighting glance. Az lifted her jaw, still staring over the younger woman's now scared and ashen face. She shook her head in a negative fashion and let her tongue rub her bottom lip.

"He doesn't want to know." Az murmured. "I highly doubt that he wants you to know. I didn't offer the information to you."

"This is bullshit." DG said bluntly and her sister eyed her with near amusement at the sudden sharply frustrated tone and blunt wording. "Honestly, Az… Bits of information that don't make sense. Silly things happening to make us question our choices."

"What did you see?" Azkadellia stepped tight into her sister's personal space, her voice suddenly flooded with concern. "Dorothy?"

DG blinked wide and light eyes up at her, "Two girls and a boy."

Azkadellia's face instantly softened. "Yours?"

DG just nodded as her eyes swept to the dusty floorboards. "His."

The older of the two reached up, her fingers stroking against her sister's cheek, "A decade at the very least, Dorothy. Probably two. I promise you."

"It's not enough." She whispered sadly.

Azkadellia didn't say anything, just looped her fingers against her sister's.

* * *

She watched him quietly, eyes following the movements of his body as he sparred with one of the younger soldiers. He was easily blocking fists thrown and feinting away from rolled shoulders, each time pushing the young man back into position for another try. She listened to the roll of his voice as he offered supportive comments, and the dip of it when shunting the negatives. His hands caught the boy's shoulders and he threw the smaller frame back across the fenced in field.

"Again." He flicked his fingers toward himself, eyes entirely focused brightly on the way the boy was nervously eyeing him from a crouch.

DG crossed her arms over her chest and smiled at the way he'd shucked the black jacket and vest to the rail, his white shirt already sweat through and hastily untucked in the back. His boots were dusted and muddied but his pants were near immaculate black. The boy's body jerked awkwardly and he stepped loosely back, realizing that she was leaning a hip against the fence line.

"Ma'am." He nodded to her. "Princess."

"I'm just watching." She waved a hand between them, catching the way Wyatt turned his head back to cast her a smile.

Her eyes flicked to the way the younger man took his distraction as an advantage and she laughed brightly when Cain ducked the awkward blow that was aimed for him, catching the attacker around the waist and swinging him back up. He laughed and pushed the boy gamely back to his starting point.

"Good try, Declan." He nodded as he laughed louder, hands open. "Again."

She watched him playfully spar with the young soldier, catching the way frustration was starting to redden Declan's face. DG stepped along the fencing, easily pulling her Consort's jacket up off of it so that she could hug it comfortably into her chest, arms crossed over it. Her eyes lifted again as Cain's voice softened, his hand going to the boy's shoulder as he spoke quietly but with a supportive uplift. She forced a smile onto her face as the both of them headed toward her. She drew the lapel of the simply cut black jacket to her lips, rubbing the fabric there while she smiled past it to him.

Wyatt leaned his elbows onto the rail, "Hey there, Princess."

She didn't keep her smile from reflexively growing wider, noting the way Declan was watching them with interested humor. "You, have an appointment before dinner, Captain."

"Do I?" he asked playfully as he tried to slow his breathing to an even draw and exhale.

DG just nodded and hugged the fabric tighter to her chest. "Unless you need to attend to the Guard, I'd like a word."

"The Guard can attend itself awhile." He'd put the bridge of a boot on the bottom rail and he lifted his weight against it, drawing himself up and over as she stepped back. "Declan, tell the Lieutenant I'll be unavailable until after I meet with the Queen at dinner."

"Yes, sir." Declan's face was bright with a knowing grin that instantly disappeared as Cain cocked him an arched brow and a stern glance.

"Now, please." He jerked his head sharply toward the palace.

DG watched the boy hustle over the fence and head quickly in the same direction.

When he laughed after the boy she slapped him right in the ribs. "Don't be mean."

"I'm not." He reached for the jacket and pulled it from her hands but didn't put it on.

DG let him lay it over her shoulders, a hand gentling her hair from under it to spread back down before he kissed the side of her head. She waited quietly as he reached back to tuck in the still mostly white shirt. He tugged up the vest as well and slid it over broad shoulders, the way the bottom hem met his pants and snugged his slim waist as he buttoned it was drawing and holding her attention.

"He needs discipline." Cain murmured gently and let his palm spread her back.

"You should be disciplined." Her face was smug as she inched her jaw up at him.

Wyatt grinned and lowered both his face and voice, his hand stroking suggestively lower than her back. "Princess, I'm perfectly willing to test your theory of discipline whenever you're prepared to do so."

DG rolled her eyes and thwacked him gently in the ribs once again.

* * *

"I'm scared." Her hands were both digging tight into the front of his shirt but her eyes refused to lift to his.

Cain drew in a slow and patient breath, swallowing the dusty scent of hay and feed. The musky scent of the horses was a comfort to him and he'd realized it was something that they were starting to share. She seemed more open and vocal in the stables, away from her family. Certainly more than she'd been since nervously dressing in the bedroom they'd shared. He lifted both hands against her face, angling his wrists so that she had to look up at the way his head dipped.

"Scared of what, baby?" he shook his head, "Zero's not getting past that maze without us knowing and if he does… DG, I won't hesitate to put a bullet in the bastard. Not, not after - "

"It's not Zero." She shook her head minutely. "Zero's just a very small part of a way bigger picture. How am I supposed to be Queen? I'm a slipper, right? I don't know what I'm doing."

She tried to pull away from him but he tightened his fingers against her face, "Don't run, Dorothy."

She slid her eyes closed at the cautious warning tone of truth he'd given her. There had been a begging edge to the words and she leaned her face farther into his hands in response. Her fingers loosened in the fabric of his shirt so that she could let both palms flatten to his chest with ease.

"Tin Men follow through," he said softly, "and Gale women become Queens."

"A month ago I was a waitress." Her eyes were fading in color when he caught sight of them.

Wyatt gave her a sad smile. "A month ago I was in a tin box. I'm free now."

"I'm concerned that you're not more concerned about this." She dropped her forehead into his chest, letting it press hard on his collarbone. "You're the one that I thought would say this plan is balls out crazy."

"I'll help you do this." His hand lifted to sift into her hair, "Marry me, DG?"

It wasn't necessarily a question.

It wasn't really an order.

It was the simple in-between.

Exactly what she'd come to expect and love from him.

"I may have lied earlier." She admitted when she looked up and at first he was concerned but her eyes sparked brighter in color.

"You're avoiding the question." He didn't let himself smile back at her.

She shrugged and smoothed his shirt, "I know exactly how many are yours."

"Dorothy." He warned against her, head angling hard as he tangled both hands into her dark hair.

She blinked a smile up at him, one that ultimately seemed both shy and confident. "I'll do it, but you have to tell my mother."

The color in his face flushed brighter and she breathed easier as his eyes slipped closed and his fingers softened and soothed on her scalp. "Deal."


	21. Chapter 21

_Author's Note: I dislike notes such as these but I did want to interject to let you guys know that I'll be wrapping up 'Sky Water' within a few chapters. Not all the questions, plot points, will have been entirely addressed in just this story. It was always a plan to use this story as a starting point for my own universe. I will keep writing this universe, but in different fics. 'Sky Water' itself is the groundwork for the way I see the Outer Zone after the mini-series. Thank you, thank you, thank you, for reading along. You're awesome for sticking with it, me, and the characters. - J.L._

* * *

"Where the hell have you been?!" there was an excited tweak to his tone that he couldn't cover up as he searched his son's face over the communications screen.

"Well it's not like we're technological geniuses around here." Jeb grumped back, his eyes hard to read in the low light of the barely functioning screen. "It took awhile. And then I didn't wanna leave it running all the time in case someone went messing with it."

"Good." Wyatt nodded, "Good thinking, Jeb."

The younger man's face was a passive a moment before he finally m\let half a smile lift at his lips. "It's good to see you're all right."

"You too, kid." He let his face soften. "Everything under control?"

"Well," the younger man winced as his shoulders shrugged slightly. "I've had some trouble with some of the Unwanteds coming topside and messing around. Re-instated a lotta officers to keep patrols going. There's been a few issues here and there, explosions and such. Nothing that we haven't been able to handle yet. I've instituted a curfew until I hear some solid planning from your end."

Cain nodded, "Zero hasn't tunneled in on you at all?"

"If he has, I'm not hearing a breath of it." Jeb shook his head and obviously leaned closer to the screen as Wyatt could see the dark tired weight under his eyes. "That doesn't mean he hasn't but… I'm paying off a few people to keep track of his movements."

"We got - "

"I know." Jeb interjected and rubbed his hand against his scruffy jaw, making himself look older than he was. "I heard about it around the same time you were probably limping away."

"I wasn't the one limping."

"Royals are all right?"

Wyatt cocked his head in silence, knowing that while he trusted his son… he didn't necessarily trust communications that could be tracked by anyone with a good sense of technology and a communications panel somewhere between the two of them. He let his face go passive and watched his son nod in sudden understanding.

"Send me word, then." Jeb said with a nod. "You know the way."

"I wanna speak again tomorrow, Jeb." He nodded a smile at the screen.

Jeb finally matched it in effort and width. "Will do, Captain."

"I love you, kid." He felt how odd it was on his tongue, tasted the strangeness of saying words that had come so easily to a child to a now grown man.

Jeb's eyes went slightly wider with surprise, his voice caging. "Love you too, Pops."

* * *

He turned his hand slowly, edging the razor down his jaw as smoothly as possible while he listened to her idly hum in the other room. Wyatt unwittingly smiled into the sound of it and stared at his reflection as the sound of her voice lulled quiet from outside the door. It had a pretty ring to it and even the mundane moment checkered heat over his throat as he listened to her. He looked over his face, carefully laying the razor back to his skin as he warmed to the domestic moment that would be over far too soon for his liking.

"Hey," her voice was soft as she leaned into the doorway.

"Hey." He answered just as quietly. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing." Her fingers stretched to stroke against the horse that was still laying on the table. "Just… nervous. That stupid?"

"Your parents in combination are enough to make a Runner nervous." He winked at her and rinsed the razor, toweling it down to the table before lifting to wipe against his jaw.

DG moved into the bathroom, laying her cheek warm and heavy against his upper arm as he dried his face. One of her hands curved the bottom hem of the vest he was wearing before tripping up under it to flatten on his stomach, rubbing into the cotton of his shirt. He leaned his lips onto the top of her head as he set the towel down, his left hand turning back to stroke against her hip.

"What's wrong, DG?" His hips drove into hers, backing her up against the table so that she had to press into the front of his chest to keep balanced upward.

Her slim shoulders shrugged. "I'm getting there, Wyatt. It's a lot to wrap my head around."

He nodded and stroked his hands onto her sides, amusement lighting his face as he looked over her. With sure palms against her waist he lifted her suddenly against the edge of the table, forcing both her hands to grip against his chest as he stepped in between her legs. Once of his palms drove behind her quickly to push the trinkets she was keeping away from her as he laid a kiss against her throat.

"You can't just keep doing that to divert my attention." She sighed the words out quietly, one of her hands rubbing at his freshly shaved jaw.

"You're going to go in there, say exactly what you think, what you feel, and what you want." His head lifted as he spoke, eyes bright points of immaculate blue. "Exactly as Queen would."

"And then?" she laughed up a disbelieving response.

"Then I'm going to tell your mother that I'm marrying you whether she likes it or not."

She snorted a laugh and settled her palms on his forearms as he rubbed her thighs in a soothing motion. Wyatt smirked and leaned in to kiss her lightly, his face far brighter than it had been even just a full day before. She accepted the kiss warmly, smiling into it as his hands curled her thighs, one of them rubbing up into the heat of her through her pants.

She broke the kiss and nudged her forehead into his, "Don't you dare."

He just grinned wickedly, "Don't what?"

DG gripped his wrist still as he rubbed hard against the fabric of her pants, teasing against her while he smiled. She shook her head and pulled up at his hand, lifting his easily moved palm up so that she could look over the mark that had almost entirely faded from view. Her lips pressed into the center of the circle and she felt the heat of it momentarily flaring bright before lulling again. His other hand stroked against her cheek before he leaned in and caught her mouth again. Wyatt kissed her slowly and gently, letting her control the slide of their tongues together before pulling back and looking over her face.

"I need you to know something." He broached quietly. "Before we say anything."

Sudden worry darkened her eyes but he kept running his fingertips at her jaw line to settled the agitation. "I'm not just replacing her with you, okay?"

"I didn't say that you are." She shook her eyes down and he let her jaw drop.

"You're too smart not to have considered it." He admitted. "You didn't trap me into this DG, and I'm sorry if you feel like I'm trapping you."

"You're not, Tin Man." She tried to lighten the weight of his words with soft tone and a smile. "We trapped each other."

"It wouldn't have worked if it wasn't a natural truth." His palm lifted spread open between them. "This? This connection? It wouldn't have happened."

"The emerald?" she angled her head up at him.

"The emerald wouldn't support a potential liability in its own Queen unless the benefits outweighed the possible negatives." He said gently. "Your mother knows that. She knows your father is a good man. That he's loyal to her and he loves her."

"Because of the emerald?"

He just smiled, "The emerald knows because she knows it. And she knows it because the emerald knows it."

"You're saying that I couldn't have made you Consort if a part of me hadn't wanted to do it?" She blinked at him. "Or if a part of you hadn't had wanted to - "

"Exactly." He nodded. "Natural truth. It wouldn't have worked."

She studied his face for a moment and his chest loosened into a flood of warmth when a smile passed wide over her lips. "We're in this, cowboy."

He nodded with a laugh, "Pretty deep."

* * *

She didn't eat much while she listened to them strategize once again, feeling as though they had been in this moment over and over again before. Only this time… this time Azkadellia was to one side of her while he was relaxed warmly in the chair to her right. His body was slacked slightly into the wood but his hand was alert to his thigh, inched near his weapon while the other reached for his water glass. He sipped at it while her mother was speaking and gave her a subtle wink before setting it back down.

"I need to say something." It wasn't the first time she'd interrupted the conversation and, as it had every time, his hand soothed to lay against her leg gently under the table. "I'm sorry."

Lavender considered her quietly and opened a hand, "Go ahead."

"I don't have a problem with the timetable." DG allowed, "I'm not arguing that you need to publicly name me heir. I'm not fighting you on, well, any of it."

Her mother's eyes narrowed in worried suspicion. "But?"

"But.." DG leaned forward. "I need time to learn everything. I'll need advisors and time with Tutor."

"I agree." Ahamo inserted quietly while he set his fork to his plate. "No one is arguing that, dear."

DG nodded and lifted a hand so that she could continue. "I will do this because it's what needs to happen. I'll do it because…"

"DG." His voice was soft to her right.

"Because this is where I want to be." Her voice still thready but gaining strength as she leaned forward, her hand spreading against the table. "But I will do this the way I want to do it."

Her eyes lifted to her mother's and they watched each other for a moment. She caught the questioning on the older woman's face but didn't swallow the words that she'd let out. His hand squeezed warmly against her leg and rubbed against it slowly, staying connected as she held her mother's fairer eyes.

"I understand." Lavender nodded. "I'm not going to fight with you, Dorothy. I want this to be easy. It won't be, but I want - "

"I'm getting married."

He abruptly coughed on his own tightened breathing, hand clenching against her thigh as her shoulders straightened higher, her eyes focused tightly on her mother's. Wyatt winced his eyes shut a moment and let the other hand to pinch against the bridge of his nose. He heard Glitch's nervous chuckle of laughter from across the table and he opened bright eyes to glare the other man down. There was still a glint of amusement in his eyes and Wyatt rolled a look back to the woman beside him.

"So much for our deal." He murmured.

DG shrugged and banked a broad glance at him, voice clear and confident. "You told me to say what I want to say."

"We'll discuss this later." Lavender soothed out gently, her face a gray mirror of frustration.

"It's only family here." Azkadellia's voice was a sturdy stanchion of support from beside them as she leaned in and lifted her own drink. "I don't see why we can't discuss it now."

"I agree." DG rolled on, "What exactly did you want to discuss? Wedding dresses? Matching shoes?"

"Dorothy." Lavender's eyes went a tweak of gray that she didn't remember seeing often before. "I have plenty of concerns that I would like to address but I would prefer to do so privately."

"DG." He warned against her quietly. "Let it go, sweetheart."

"I will not." Her face, as she turned to him, was an un-aged photograph of her mother's.

They sat three seats away from each other but they were the mimicry of each other, separated only by annuals. The lift of each jaw and the fervor in each pair of eyes. He noted that Azkadellia was the calm and repose between the two of them, sipping quietly on water while she cocked her head to an angle before setting the glass down. She thoughtfully gauged the words on her tongue before letting them out.

"You cannot expect her to become the crown if you don't trust her judgment." Az said gently between them. "You cannot ask her to grow up and deny her any of the pleasures received in becoming an adult."

"Azkadellia." Lavender's voice warned sternly.

She glared pointedly at her mother, "You want her to become you. She will never be you."

"I can do this, Az." DG whispered.

"You shouldn't have to." Azkadellia responded sharply and turned back to her mother. "She chose him. The emerald obviously supported that choice. You may have your private concerns. You may also keep them to yourself."

Ahamo's palm slammed hard against the table in an eerie reflection of days before that even Cain noted, "Girls. That's enough."

Wyatt stared quietly at the obviously tiring face of the other man that sat across from him. Ahamo looked blankly to him a moment before shaking his head so that he was staring down at his hand. He turned the back of his hand against the top of the table, palm lifted up while he stared at it quietly.

"Captain," he breathed out in swallowed emotion, "Show me your hand."

Wyatt made the same movement and laid his hand to the table, the mark flashing up from the table top as he stared at the man who's voice had been quiet but forceful. Ahamo nodded and leaned his head to the side before he looked to his younger daughter. DG lifted her hand slowly and laid it beside Cain's, watching the light in their hands brighten before dimming to a barely there whisper of color.

The older man's head turned to his wife, "I wasn't noble when you marked me."

Lavender's face was still unreadable.

"I was a slipper. I had nothing." He continued tiredly. "I couldn't protect you then the way that he guards her. I had no knowledge of the Zone."

"Ahamo." Lavender's voice betrayed sadness even as her face stayed clear.

"He knows this place and he knows her." The older Consort closed his hand against the surface of the table, pushing his plate away with the other. "We have nothing to say, Lavender."

The Queen turned her head slowly, her face softening as she looked over her youngest daughter's face. She breathed in slowly and shook her head, eyes drifting away from all of them while she lifted a thin hand to rub against her lips thoughtfully. Wyatt stiffened slightly when she pointedly glanced back at him, eyes raking over his face before she took another breath, lips parted minutely.

"Dorothy…" she shook her head.

"I'm not… it's not to hurt you." DG spoke uncomfortably.

"I know." Lavender whispered and slowly smiled at her daughter, the movement seeming odd an awkward to all of them.

It seemed even stranger when she let out a stagnant laugh of surprised hysteria.

"You say that she won't be me?" she cocked a glance at the still furious way Azkadellia was looking at her. "My angels, the both of you already are."

Ahamo chuckled as he pressed his knuckles against his bottom lip. "Stubborn, ferocious, and beautiful."

"I don't understand what's so funny." DG looked between the two of them. "I don't - "

"Children are funny things." Lavender whispered as her laughter quieted, her eyes softening on her daughter. "Especially when they grow up."

* * *

He knew that the other man requesting assistance in leaving the dinner table was just a ruse to leave the three women on their own. He'd been cautious of responding until DG had stroked her hand against his hip, nudging gently. Her eyes had been gentle as she'd nodded and smiled quietly at him. His mouth brushed her temple as she left the table and he deliberately caught her mother's glance before moving around the opposite end of the table to offer an arm to Ahamo. They made slow but rhythmic steps into the hall and toward the stairs.

"Don't be offended." Ahamo said in a low but clear tone.

"No." Wyatt shook his head in frustration. "Not at all."

"You understand her reasoning?" the older of the two was making good time up the steps for still being in a significant amount of pain.

Wyatt refused to look at the other man. "Not entirely."

"DG may trust you infinitely, Captain, but it's a mother's job to distrust. She guards Dorothy in her way. You in yours."

Wyatt tipped a sideways glance, "I'm not leaving her."

"Lavender trusts the words of only one man." The older of the two breathed out raggedly, forcing Cain to stop halfway up the steps. "Much as I would assume her daughter does."

* * *

She listened quietly to the way her mother spoke, her voice far more relaxed and casual than it was when other people were around. She was softly telling them a long ago Two Princesses story that had DG grinning into her coffee cup as her hands warmed against it. Azkadellia was leaned back in her own chair watching their mother laugh into words that she didn't recall.

"Tutor never again asked either of you to feed the horses." She shook her head quietly, eyes casting sidelong. "I'm not even sure he remembers that."

"I doubt he'd forget." Az gentled as she poured another cup for herself. "He doesn't seem to forget much."

"You should ask him." Lavender murmured, sadness suddenly filling the space where reminiscent amusement had been.

DG was still smiling though, watching her mother's face gentle farther as she leaned back comfortably in her chair. She smiled into the way Lavender looked over the both of them and sighed out a heaved breath.

"Girls… I'm sorry it has to be this way." She shook her head as she stared into her cup and DG swallowed quietly. "You deserved very different lives."

"I'm happy." DG said gently, looking at her mother's paled face. "Not pleased with some aspects of the situation but… generally, I'm happy."

Lavender looked disbelieving at her youngest child, "You cannot be happy that you're being thrown into a situation beyond your control. I know you better than you think I do, DG."

She smiled broadly at the fact her mother's voice softened on the nickname. "I was thrown into a situation, literally, when I slipped through and look what I have now. No, it's not an ideal situation. But - "

"DG." Az's voice pressed from beside her. "You don't have to pretend that you're - "

"I'm not entirely pretending, Az." She set the cup down, "I have family and friends here. I have a place. I belong here…"

Lavender's face had warmed as she smiled at her daughter.

"I have someone that I know would put himself between me and death." Her eyes fixed on the empty cup. "He'll be the father of my children…"

Lavender's face slackened as she once again settled into her chair, shoulders slumping into it as she studied the mixed emotions on her child's face. "Dorothy. Look at me."

DG looked up after a moment, her eyes jangling a mix of emotions that her mother couldn't read.

"You know this?"

The youngest of the three nodded, looking down again as her sister lovingly wiped her hair back behind her ear. "I know it. "

"I have my private concerns." Their mother spoke slow and quiet as she leaned a knowing glance toward the both of them. "And I promise to keep them to myself."

DG could only laugh into the way Azkadellia snorted at the older woman's response.

* * *

He didn't realize that she was there, one of his hands lifted and holding a sheaf of papers up from the desk while he wrote quickly on another. He was so intently focused on what he was doing, the hand that was up, finally leaning against his head while he elbowed the desk that he was working at. DG studied him quietly from the doorway of the small makeshift office that he'd taken control of, her shoulder aiming against the frame of the door while she watched him hesitate in writing. After a while of her watching he looked up, moving his hand so that he could see what he had written before and her still form in the doorway caught his attention.

"How long have you been there?" Cain asked gently.

She shrugged idly, "Ten minutes. I just left Az and my mother."

"How'd it go?" he set the papers to the desk.

DG just shrugged once again, "Reports?"

"Coding a message to Jeb and copying it. I'll have three men each carry a copy." He let the nibbed pen roll off his fingers gently as he stretched back into the leather covered chair. "How'd it go?"

She lifted him a tired glance, head tipping to the side, "I'm going to take a bath. A hot one. And when I'm done…"

"Hmm?" he perked his chin up, leading her to continue.

"Could you please make sure that you're in my bed," Her eyes tipped over the spread of his shoulders as a smile tweaked her lips. "Consort?"

He smiled warmly at her and nodded, once again lifting the pen to finish, "Yes, Princess."


	22. Chapter 22

"It'll be interesting," Az murmured quietly as she looped her arm into the crooked elbow he'd offered her as they'd met in the hall. "to have a brother."

Wyatt smiled into the affection she'd allowed into her tone, "It wasn't necessarily supposed to be announced so… bluntly."

"I find it amusing that you figured DG would allow it to be announced in any other way, Wyatt." Her teasing tone only turned his mouth up into the beginnings of a knowing smile. "She can't help but be blunt. She's too honest a creature for niceties."

"She'll need to learn a bit of her sister's political finesse then." He slowed his pace as Azkadellia tugged against his arm, her head leaning against him as she pressed into his upper arm and shoulder.

"No." Az shook her head vehemently and looked back up at him. "I like her just the way she is. Guileless."

"As do I." he agreed with a laugh. "Although, she wouldn't tell me how it went with your mother."

Az nodded slowly as he aimed her to the door of her room, "A truce, I think."

"That won't be enough for her." He sighed the words out, "She wants her family to be at peace. A truce won't be enough."

"It'll be fine, Captain." She pressed off his body and into the door, her hand curling the knob carefully. "Mother certainly backed off once she heard that she was getting grandchildren out of the deal."

She left him standing awkwardly outside her door, laughing at the befuddled look on his face as she closed it on him.

* * *

Glitch felt the presence of someone else in the room as soon as he'd entered it. His mind had been fixed on tinkering with some of the wiring in the communications system, hopefully to amp the signal and make it stronger or, at the least, clearer. But he'd paused just inside the door, head tipped as he heard the girl's breathing.

"Darcy?" he asked quietly. "Are you back here again?"

"Thought maybe you'd be back." She was sitting on the floor against the wall, her knees tucked up and the dress she was wearing curled tight around her legs.

"Kid, you gotta get some sleep. All right?" he leaned forward and put his hand down toward the girl, noticing that she was obviously exhausted.

"What if you need help?" she asked him quietly.

He just laughed and tugged at her hand. "I'll come wake you up."

* * *

Raw quietly watched the rider start to close in on the sentry post, the light from the outer fires glaring on the mostly white horse. He'd known that someone was coming back from Finaqua and as the rider drew closer he could feel that it wasn't in animosity. There was a sort of giddy excitement radiating off the man that was pounding the horse closer and faster as he neared the Viewers.

"Let Raw." He put his hand to one of the other Viewers, squeezing the other male's arm with a half smile before stepping out from the deeper darkness of the trees.

He watched quietly as the man on the horse lifted both hands, his knees squeezing against the animal to urge a slowing as they neared. Raw lifted a hand in response and nodded with a smile. He read the man easily, feeling the wave of excitement off the young soldier.

"In Finaqua?"

"All of them." The man dismounted the horse and offered an open and empty hand.

Raw put both his palms to the other man's hand. "Come eat. Rest. Raw return with you."

"That's exactly why I'm here." The soldier grinned. "Captain Cain sent me to ride back with you if you wanted to come."

Raw just nodded happily and kept hold on the man's hand. "Rest first. Eat."

The young man laughed, "I could eat."

* * *

She'd been in the water long enough for it to entirely cool, the brisk air combining with the chill of it to shiver her. She hadn't noticed though, not at first. It wasn't until she'd gritted her teeth from chattering and her jaw spiked an ache that she realized how cold she was. DG sat up quickly, shaking off the thoughts that had been running over and over again in her head. Nervous circuitous revisits to what they were planning on doing, how she could even manage it, whether her mother would settle enough to just…

"You're shivering." His voice was a calm hush of worry, hand already wrapping her in a towel as she stepped from the tub. "Damn it, DG… Talk to me?"

She tucked into the warm spread of his chest, allowing a shivering and shuddering breath from her lungs while he closed his arms silently around her. He lifted the soaked tendrils of dark hair up from inside the towel and tucked it tighter against her back, letting his face down against the crown of her head.

"Please?" He asked gently.

"It's just overwhelming." She spoke into the heat of his shirt, fingers tucking against it as she felt it dampen from the water on her skin. "I'm… I'm taking it in."

"DG." Cain dipped his head lower. "You can do this."

She smiled up at him and the sudden break of it after her silence was enough to draw a smile to his lips as well. He lifted a finger to trace her smile as her eyes slipped closed and she preened into the stroking touch. Wyatt laid a kiss onto her forehead and let the other arm tighten her into his chest even farther.

"I'm getting you wet." She let her head rest against his shoulder.

"Gimme a few minutes," he nodded his smile against the side of her head, "I'll return the favor."

Her tired laughter bent into a surprised noise when he lifted her quickly up off the floor and into his arms.

* * *

"I apologize." He was kissing down the center line of her sternum, still fully clothed while she lay naked and shivering beneath him.

"For what?" DG was drawing soothing circles on his temple, fingers light of touch while she watched his mouth dip against her breasts.

He smiled up at her, one of his hands stroking the outer curve of one of them, "For not being in the bed, as requested."

"S'okay." She arched into the stroking of his hand, her palm cupping against the back of his head to aim his mouth easily over her nipple. "This time."

He groaned into the way she'd so easily directed his movements, pleased at the free movement of her thighs as they caught and tightened against his waist. Wyatt let his tongue run back and forth on her nipple, feeling the chill on her skin while he sucked lightly. He turned his weight onto one palm so that he could catch against her hip as he shifted. DG sighed annoyance as he drew his mouth away from her, shifting to sit up between her legs. His hands shifted her knees up and to his sides so that he could scrub warm calloused palms against her thighs, flushing heat on her skin as he looked over her.

"What?" DG smirked into the lazy way he was studying her.

Wyatt let his tongue run his bottom lip, mouth parted open, "I thought, at first, that I'd finally gone insane. I'd made you up in my head as some sort of distraction. You weren't really there… just an echo in my head."

DG put her hands down to grip on his wrists, pulling her body up against his. He shifted easily, tugging her into his lap as he sat back on the bed, lifting her hips as he shifted her tight. His pants already thoroughly soaked through from her damp skin.

"I'm not an echo, Wyatt." She shook her head at him, trying to keep a smile as his eyes paled further.

"No," he smiled weakly and flexed his palms on her waist before one hand slid between them, teasing between her thighs. "I knew it when I realized I could smell your hair. You didn't fade when I touched you. I could see your reflection in the water behind me."

DG leaned closer to him, letting her fingers tease his lips as she pressed into his hand. He sucked one of her fingers into his mouth, eyes following the way hers dipped nearly closed as he stroked into wet and, finally, warm heat. His smile turned to kiss against her fingertip as she drew her hand away from his mouth. She leaned in to kiss him as he started fluttering light and teasing touches along her clit.

"Who am I, Wyatt?" she asked against his lips. "I'm solid. I'm real. Who am I?"

"DG." He groaned her name into her throat in frustration.

"Mmm." She nodded and laid both hands to the sides of his head, shifting as he curved his palm to slide a finger into her. "Who am I going to be?"

"The - "

"No." she shook her head abruptly, her palms closing tighter against his scalp. "Not to everyone else. To you. Who am I?"

One hand gripped her hip while the other slid another finger inside her, his eyes lifting to watch her face as she moaned, "My wife."

"Exactly." She breathed out and dropped a kiss to his lips, letting her hands slide against his neck. "Exactly that."

This time, he was the one to shiver.

* * *

She did her best not to wake him as she shifted, her butt tingling numb as he grumbled in his sleep and drove tighter into her lower body. DG lifted the paper she'd been sketching on, eyes sweeping down the long and awkwardly angled line of his bare back as he tucked his nose tighter to her stomach. Her teeth caught the pencil she'd been using so that her free hand could fall against the back of his head, aiming to soothe him back to sleep.

"It won't work." He rubbed his nose against her, shifting up grumpily. "I'm awake now."

"So go back to sleep." She dropped quietly over him after pulling the pencil from her mouth and setting it aside. "Everything is fine."

"You can't sleep." He stretched up along side her on the mattress, his eyes blinking bleary against the light on the opposite side of the bed. "Makes it hard for me to sleep."

"I'm just… letting everything out." DG murmured and set the paper to the table as well, her shoulders inching lower in the bed. "De-stressing."

"I can tell." His eyes shadowed over the portrait of his back and hips and the way the sheet had angled just against the dip of his spine. "How many of those do you have?"

"Of you naked?" she smirked playfully. "A few."

Wyatt rolled onto his back and sighed, "Wonderful."

She just laughed quietly and turned her body against his, letting her face lay into the sweat warm spread of his chest. Her fingers spanned between his skin and her face, the slow and steady rise-to-fall of his chest a comfort that lulled her closer to tired. His hand stroking into her hair was enough to settle her completely. She let her fingers stretch up against his throat, sliding up and down against it.

"In one month I'll be heir." Her voice was a barely there whisper against his skin. "In one year I'll be Queen. That doesn't scare you?"

"DG," he sighed out. "No. It doesn't."

"You're too confident in me." She snugged her jaw down against his stomach, curling lower and tighter against him. "What if I run?"

"You won't." he kept sliding short fingers through her hair. "Not now."

"Because?"

Wyatt looked down over how slim and small she looked tucked in his lower body and put his hands back to push himself up on the bed. One of them curled her head up carefully so that she was angled against him. He let both arms drag her higher even though she refused to look up at his face. Instead he dropped his nose into her hair and rubbed into the sweet violet smell of her.

"Because you're where you belong." He kissed the words on the top of her head.

"Which sounds fine if we're writing a romance novel here but - "

"Dorothy." He sighed out the words in frustration. "You know I'll find you."

She smirked easily into the annoyance that flaked his tired tone. Her eyes finally lifted to meet his and she gave him a true grin, lifting a hand to press at the tip of his nose playfully. Wyatt nipped at her fingertip and felt the lines of his eyes soften as he smiled back at her.

"You're like a dog with a bone, Tin Man." She shook her head with a feigned sigh.

"I bite." He closed his teeth light against her finger, sucking against it to soothe the press of white teeth.

DG closed her eyes, "All three of them, Wyatt. All three are - "

He released her finger and kissed against her palm. "I know. I've known the whole time."

She smiled as he turned both hands against her ribs and leaned her easily onto her back, his eyes following the full spread of her hair as his knee made a practiced move between her legs. She let him spread her thighs with one of his own, his hand already reaching between them. Her blue eyes slid closed and he watched her face, fingers slipping against her to find her still warm and wet. He grinned at the earlier promise that echoed in his head and he tested a finger into her, watching her smile widen as her back arched her breasts up off the bed.

"In one month you'll be heir. In six you'll be a wife." He half repeated her own words back to her while he pulled his hand from her and stroked his length, half hard already. "In a year you'll be Queen, and…"

"And?" her throat was too full of breath make the word all that loud.

"And," he aimed his length against her, slowly teasing the head into her pleading whimpers, "I'll make you a mother before the ink dries on the paperwork."

The smug and sated and happy mix of a smile on her face was damn near enough to kill him heart-stop as he sank into her.

"You're a wicked man." She whispered as her hands cupped his pink-flushed ears.

Wyatt buried his face between her breasts, "Only in the way you like."

"That is true."

* * *

He knew, probably fifteen minutes before, that Raw was getting close. He'd had one of the sentries inform him that they'd been tracking two horses far in front of the maze and he aimed her toward the maze under the guise of discussing the public address that her mother was planning. He was mid-sentence, voice droning on about safety precautions, when she stopped and caught her fingers in the brush.

"DG?"

"You…" she cocked him a glance and in anticipation of her jaunting off on a run that he couldn't track he hooked his fingers in the belt of the riding pants she wore. "This isn't about the address."

"What do you mean?" he couldn't save himself from smirking, not when excitement was breaking bright over her face.

"Raw's here?" DG tucked a hand into his shirt, tugging fervently. "Am I right?"

"Walk the maze." Wyatt waved the free hand forward and caught against her as she started jerking from him, "I said walk."

DG pouted at him. "Tin Man?"

He arched a brow over the way she was prying her hip from his fingers playfully, "Fine. Go."

He loosened his fingers from her and laughed as she stumbled into an excited jog, tugging his hat lower on his head as he followed behind.

"DG happy." His hands were warm against her face, warm enough that she could ignore the misting rain that had started to dampen through her shirt. "Mostly happy."

She didn't answer, just tucked into his chest and let her head nudge into the side of his. The campfire and dust smell of him was a soothing scent that she didn't realize she'd grown to miss. Her jaw angled up against his shoulder and she turned her hand behind him, waving loose fingers to the child that was behind him. Kalm nervously lifted his hand and instantly dropped it as Cain moved up to the other side of her.

She felt the other man's hand broach her back and she leaned into it, eyes still catching Raw's face as she beamed, "Are you hungry? Do you need anything?"

"Kalm hungry." The boy piped up as he peaked his head around Raw's elbow. "Very hungry."

"Okay." She laughed and let her hands fall from her friend, one of them offered toward the child. "C'mon. I'll show you the trick to the maze."

He watched them step quickly back into the safety of the green brush with their hands linked tight, his eyes following the damp dark of her hair as long as he could before she disappeared. Wyatt turned his hand back to catch against the Viewer's arm, leaning in for a brief hug against the other man's shoulder.

"She's missed you." He said softly. "A lot."

Raw just gave him a wide smile, "Tin Man makes her smile though."

"I try." He nodded and offered a hand in front of him, nodding acknowledgement to the solider he'd sent out after the Viewer. "Go ahead and get some food and rest, kid."

"Thank you, sir." The younger man nodded and drew one horse's reins to tack to the other, lining them up so that he could maneuver them through the maze.

"You have questions?" Raw asked as they watched the other man also disappear into the maze. "Cain is nervous."

Wyatt nodded, "Zero aside, I'm still concerned."

"More darkness." Raw agreed. "Bigger."

"How safe are we really?" he asked quietly, finally leading the Viewer toward the entrance of the maze. "I'm cut off here. I don't know - "

"It builds slow." His companion interrupted. "Raw can't find it. Can't focus on it. No Viewer can. It's not ready."

"Whoever, whatever, is laying low?"

"Building in power." The other male nodded and wiped at the rainwater that was building on the furred tunic he wore. "Guilds are joining. Already declaring Queen's return."

"Really?" Cain breathed into a laugh, letting Raw step into the maze first. "The little bastards are rounding people up, huh?"

Raw smirked at him and nodded, "With sticks bigger than them."

He laughed into it and followed his friend.


	23. Chapter 23

She watched her daughters quietly, eyes resting on the oldest as she met with the boy she'd befriended days before. Kalm was more than excited to see Azkadellia and Lavender smiled easily into the way he buried himself into her daughter's hug, his arms wrapping awkwardly tight against her legs as he melted into her skirt. She caught the unexpected smile on her daughter's lips, the way it swept into heartfelt as her hands caught against the child.

"He's very hungry." DG was saying softly. "But we had to find you first."

"Very hungry?" Azkadellia asked playfully and lifted the boy's jaw so that she could look over his ecstatic face. "Then shouldn't we find you something to eat?"

He didn't answer vocally. Instead his smile answered for him.

Lavender watched the both of them move away with the child, her eyes following the lines of their backs with a pride that she couldn't quite enumerate. It was just generic parental pride – it was something else. There was a way that the young women carried themselves that made her back straighten.

They weren't just her children.

They were becoming exactly what they were meant to be.

They were princesses.

* * *

"Why?" she pouted at him, tossing aside the bed clothing to be washed while he buckled his belt. Wyatt shrugged against the way his still wet back was dampening his black cotton shirt.

"Because the Guilds are doing the work that I should be doing." He teased back, "I'm being replaced by midgets here, baby. Don't take all my pride from me til we're married, huh?"

"We've only been here a week." She stripped the bottom sheet and let it puddle into the pile, voice banking annoyed but also lilting slightly sad. "My mother - "

"I agreed with your mother's suggestion that I go." He murmured and stepped into her back, leading with his hips against the back of her. "Besides… I'm meeting Jeb."

"I know." She angled her head back so that he could nuzzle against her ear. "I just worry."

"You'll be too busy to worry." His other hand caged her hair back so that he could nudge a kiss against the break of her skull, behind her ear. "Tutor's got a full schedule for you and whatever time he doesn't have filled up, your mother's got you sitting in on political matters."

"Yay." The droll tone of her voice was in direct opposition to the way her right hand snaked up to stroke at his freshly shaven jaw. "I'm so excited."

Cain groaned easily into the way she turned a kiss back into him, her body twisting enough to the right to angle his mouth to her own. She let her tongue stroke his briefly before she nipped on his bottom lip. Wyatt intentionally flexed his fingers on her rib cage before pushing them off of her entirely, palms closing up against the urge to draw her closer.

"Don't do that." He hissed against her temple.

DG smirked as his heat drew away from her back, "Do what?"

"Make me want to stay." His palm tapped playfully against her bottom before he turned away and pulled up the vest from the back of the chair that he'd taken to leaving it curved upon.

DG turned and set her hands against her hips, watching him sling his vest on while turned away from her. She lifted a hand to wipe at the water droplets that still tingled on the back of his neck and he leaned his head back into the intimate touch while buttoning up the vest. Her other hand tugged into the tieback on the vest her face leaning onto his shoulder.

"What are you going to tell Jeb?"

"About?" he asked, feigning ignorance.

"About me." She murmured as her hand wiped from his neck and up into his short trimmed hair, thumb rubbing his hairline. "About us."

"I don't know." Wyatt shook his head minutely as he lifted the holster from the seat of the chair. "Depends."

She forced him into a turn, taking the holster from him quietly so that she could aim it over his chest. He watched her strap it against his torso, her eyes focused and lips set in a thin line of worry while she fastened first one strap, and then the one that tightened against his thigh. He let a hand drop to rub a slip of dark hair between his thumb and two fingers.

"You can't let him find out from someone else." She shook her head, looking up while she jerked the strap on his leg tighter, making his body flex forward slightly. "Wyatt."

"I'll figure it out." He murmured as he let her hair loose from his fingers. "I have to meet with Cal before I head out."

DG nodded, "I'm having breakfast with Az. Make sure you come get something before you go."

"Yes, Princess." The cocky grin he gave her when he winked just made her laugh as she rolled her eyes and let a light slap find its home against his stomach.

"Wyatt." She let him grip loosely on her wrist as she playfully pretended to pull away from the way he was tugging into her. "I meant food."

"Mmm hmm." He nodded in amusement and let her go, watching her move back toward the bed with a saddening glance. "Promise not to get in trouble while I'm gone?"

DG lifted the sheets and shrugged them into her chest, blue eyes flicking bright, "I make no such promise."

He snorted and reached for his jacket. "Didn't figure."

* * *

"Good morning, Captain." The other man's voice was a clear rung bell in his head, booming clear and jovial through his makeshift office.

"Lieutenant," he cocked an eyebrow up, "you're far too happy this early in the morning."

The younger man just smirked back and sipped slowly from his favorite dinged and dented metal cup. Callum shrugged amiably and leaned back to sit against the edge of Wyatt's desk, his shoulders still perked up tight while his legs stretched out in a relaxed fashion.

"I went to bed at a reasonable hour, Captain." He perked up over the steaming coffee with a grin. "How about you?"

"I had to correct half your paperwork before the Queen saw it." Cain answered and stepped behind his desk, tipping himself a cup of coffee, sucking in the bitter but comforting smell of it. "So no, I did not."

"They weren't necessary corrections." Cal shrugged and stood again, turning to face his commander. "You're just…"

"I'm what?" Wyatt asked with a cocked glance, eyes slimmed and the cup halfway to his lips.

"Very thorough." The younger man shrugged once again, back straightening. "Sir."

He smirked at the way the brunette grinned at him over his cup, his dark eyes points of bright and giddy mischief. Still, there was a hard line to the man's jaw that he trusted in. It was the streaked line of weariness between his eyes that told Wyatt that the excitable demeanor was a cover for a much sturdier character. His baby faced innocence was betrayed by the gray that was shading his temples. Cain didn't necessarily trust his Lieutenant entirely, but outside of DG and their self made family… Callum Lind was the closest thing to a friend he'd made since Jonah's death.

"We've talked about everything, I think." Wyatt breathed through the steam of the coffee and shrugged his glance around the office. "I just wanted to…"

"I'll watch her." Cal nodded quietly, his face panning serious enough to make him seem all the thirty seven years he'd lived. "I swear, Wyatt. Nothing's going to happen."

He just nodded in return, staring at a far off point as he swallowed the rest of the thought. His bright eyes turned back to the other man and he smirked as he lifted the cup in a half-hearted toast, "Good luck with that."

* * *

"I'm not hungry, Az. Stop." She pushed the plate away from the way her sister kept trying to urge her to eat. "I feel like all we're doing is sitting around and eating and talking about stupid, inconsequential things."

"You're stuck in the in-between." Azkadellia murmured. "You'll be training later though. You need to eat something or you'll end up exhausted."

"Az - "

"And they aren't inconsequential." The older woman countered. "Just because you don't see the end result of each decision that's made doesn't mean that it doesn't aide the people in some way."

"It's boring." DG confessed and picked up the toast, piecing some of it off and chewing on it. "I literally want to jump off the roof."

"Once you understand the politics, you can appoint someone to handle it for you. But you need to be certain of your decisions before you tell someone else to make them on your behalf." Az pushed the coffee back toward the younger woman as well. "Drink."

"You sound like - "

"Don't." Az lifted a pointing finger at her younger sister. "Don't you dare."

DG just grinned back playfully and chewed on her toast, looking her sister over quietly as she ate. The older woman's hair had lightened and evened out silky and full. Her skin was a much pinker palette than it had been before, and her eyes were a brighter mix of grays and blues and greens. Az just shook her head at her sister's teasing and sipped at her own drink, leaning her shoulders back into the chair.

"You look happy." DG whispered quietly.

"For the most part," Az inclined her head. "I am, Little Sister."

"Still having dreams?"

Azkadellia shrugged, her eyes toning darker, "Aren't you?"

"Every night." DG admitted softly, her hand letting the half eaten toast settle back to the plate. "It scares the hell out of him."

When she looked up her sister was watching her with quiet interest. "But it doesn't scare you?"

"Sometimes." DG shrugged. "Not always. I know they're just dreams in my head but…"

Az was still just staring at her, unmoving as she waited.

"He doesn't know what to do with me when I forget that." DG shrugged and breathed out a half laugh. "And then he gets frustrated that he can't fix it and it's sorta cute."

The older of the two gave her sister an understanding glance, "Let's walk a little before you meet with Tutor."

"I told Cain I'd be here." DG said gently as her sister stood.

"He'll find you." Azkadellia offered a nod and an open palm and she took it easily.

* * *

"Wyatt."

He stalled his steps down the hall, not entirely comfortable that the older woman had used his first name. It was…awkward. She rarely referred to him as anything but 'Captain' anymore and it stilted his steps. Cain turned slowly on a heel and dipped his head, watching warily as the Queen moved toward him intently.

"I just have a few more things to attend to before I - "

"I know." She nodded kindly and put her hand to his elbow, turning him back so that they were walking beside each other.

That was also awkward.

He avoided the urge to look at her face, "Did you need something?"

"I need you to come back here in one piece." Lavender said softly. "That's a direct order, Captain. Do you understand me?"

He finally cocked a glance her way, ignoring the smile that tweaked the corner of his mouth, preferring instead to just watch her face soften. "I do."

"I'd like you to take Glitch with you." She nodded him to continue toward the front large entrance doors. "As scattered as he can be, he is still an asset when it comes to physical confrontations."

"You don't think he's of better use here?"

The Queen just shook her head, "I do not. I think that one more person on guard with you is worth temporarily losing his expertise. And he'll be of use to you with the Guildlings."

"Why Glitch?" he asked quietly.

"Because, regardless of Raw's healing abilities, my husband is in no condition to ride. This is the only way to silence him on the subject." Her sudden stop in the hall surprised him and he turned a smile back at her, eyes lighting up in mild amusement.

"The Royal Consort is concerned for my safety?" he cocked her a half teasing grin.

"No," Lavender smiled softly back and waved toward the doors. "Your future father-in-law is concerned for his daughter's mental health. Dorothy is walking the grounds with her sister."

"Without the protection of the Guard, no doubt." He was already leaning in the direction of the doors.

Lavender just smirked into his frustrated tone, shaking her head in brief amusement while his flat palm jolted the door open roughly.

* * *

Jeb scrubbed his hands against his face, itching on the stubble that had started to drive him manic. His fingers dug against his jaw while he toed off his boots and shucked them easily across the small bedroom. He'd had around ten hours more than enough and daylight or not, he was going to get a wash and some sleep.

His hands scraped and scrabbled against his clothing, heading for the bathroom sleepily while he stripped. He bypassed the mess of clothing that he'd strewn through both rooms, trying to ignore how guilty he felt for not picking up after himself.

His mother had always hated that…

He mentally promised, as he tipped the hot water handle on the tub, that he'd pick them up on the way back through.

But a bath, some sleep, and a day's ride to meet his father.

The bath was going to have to be short - he was going to need a lot of sleep.

* * *

He smirked and idled his steps beside the younger man, watching the nervous way Declan glanced up at him, eyes widening. He hushed the boy with a finger to his lips, eyes moving off the young soldier's to find the two women a few feet away, their steps slow and happily lagging through one of the gardens that was starting to re-bloom.

"I saw them leave. Didn't think they should be alone."

Wyatt nodded and set his hand to the young man's shoulder, stopping his steps, "Exactly as you should have done. Thank you."

Declan gave him a mixed glance and then nodded in agreement when Wyatt just aimed him back. He gave both princesses another quiet glance before moving off. Cain watched him for a few moments before turning to follow Az and DG again, his hand setting to the butt of his weapon while his eyes followed the line of the younger woman. She'd been laughing about something, teasing her sister with an upward grin to the taller woman. Az just shoved playfully back against her.

"Ladies." His voice culled louder. "You are without protection."

Az smirked back and shook her head, "The boy was doing just fine, Captain."

"You knew he was there?" he asked with a matched grin.

"He isn't subtle." DG responded as she reached a hand toward him.

He didn't take her hand at first and he watched her eyes slim as her palm lifted. His fingers caught against hers, face flushing as she tipped a warm kiss against his jaw and leaned soft against his chest. The smirking glance Az was arching over her sister's head was enough to blush him entirely.

"That's my cue, I believe." The older sister murmured and caught against his arm. "Be safe, Wyatt."

The way the women in her family were suddenly using his first name was unnerving him.

It was far more intimate than he'd expected them to be.

Far quicker than he had expected.

He nodded her a smile as she stepped back toward the palace, her fingers swinging a loose handful of flowers as she moved away from them. DG grinned at him but the movement seemed forced. It wasn't reaching the lovely blue of her eyes. It wasn't lighting them as it usually would.

"I'm coming right back, ya know?" he rubbed the words into her hair.

"I don't like being separated." She mumbled into his shirt collar, listening to the rhythmic sweep of his breathing. "We're both pretty large targets right now."

Wyatt just nodded and looped his arms against her hips. "You know I'm coming back."

DG just nodded and lifted a truer smile. "I do. I just don't know what condition you'll be in."

"Probably tired, cranky, and dirty."

DG kissed quick against his lips and he could smell the flowers on her skin, "The first two are pretty normal."

"I'm pretty dirty most of the time too." He was teasing against her ribs, fingers rubbing on her.

She smiled into the way his mouth curved against her throat, her arms slinging up against him. "Cain?"

"Hmm?"

"If there's so much as a scratch on you?"

"Yeah?" he nose brushed her jaw.

"You're not getting any."

He hissed out a wincing breath, "That's low, Princess. Bad form."

She just smirked into the way he tugged her closer.


End file.
